


Gravity Queen

by Valis



Category: Gravity Rush, ワンパンマン | One-Punch Man
Genre: Cliche Amnesia, Gen, Superhero Fight Scenes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-18
Updated: 2017-06-05
Packaged: 2018-09-18 09:53:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 43,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9379307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Valis/pseuds/Valis
Summary: Kat wakes up in a strange place, with no memories of how she got there. Only this time around she's not the only Hero in town.





	1. Déjà Vu

**Author's Note:**

> With Gravity Rush 2 out later this week, I've been replaying the first one and wondered if this particular crossover existed already. It didn't, so I fixed it.  
> Still not sure if I want there to be shipping or not so the tags'll be updated as we go for that and if the rating needs tweaking for the fight scenes.  
> Think that's everything, so hope you enjoy.

# Gravity Queen

## 

Part 1 - Déjà Vu

**G City - 4 weeks after the Boros Incident ******

********

It was a pretty standard Saturday afternoon in the western market district, full of hustle and bustle from the street side stores to the plaza filled with small stalls trading everything from food, fashion, and the traditional past time of many that was gossiping over the newspapers.

"You hear what The Hero Association's plans are for that giant fortress they built on A City? Apparently it's so they can guarantee something like that can't happen again," a man asked his friend, skimming over the headlines as the two wandered back home carrying their haul of groceries.  
"They couldn't stop it happening the first time so I'm not exactly getting my hopes up," the second scoffed as he idly rummaged through his shopping bag. "Between the disasters, more and more monsters showing up and then that, I swear heroes are seeming more useless by the day. Why people still donate to that crap I don't understand."  
"Jeez, little harsh there. They are trying to save people, you know?"  
"It's their jobs, they should try harder and then maybe I'd respect them," was the snide counter, followed by a hmph as he pulled a red apple out of the bag, "and speaking of people not doing their jobs, the hell did this come from?"

With a few grumblings about useless tellers and untrained idiots, the man turned and hurled the apple as hard as he could in a random direction, sending it soaring up and over the rooftops. His buddy stopped and stared.  
"Dude, seriously, who pissed in your breakfast this morning?"

The apple's journey was short, cresting over the rooftop before hurtling down into the space where two alleyways crossed around a lone oak tree and straight into the lap of a girl unconscious at its base. Jolted awake by the impact, she looked down at what woke her with befuddlement.

" _An apple? Why am I getting a sense of déjà vu right now?_ " She mused, pulling herself up and dusting off her black clothes, careful not to dislodge the ornate golden metal bands she wore over the top. A couple twigs needed removing from her blonde hair and a minor adjustment to the black scarf that trailed behind her left her feeling much more presentable. At least enough to deal with a much more pressing concern.

"Where am I?" Nothing looked familiar. And it wasn't just because it was a random alleyway. The walls of the surrounding buildings, the pavement beneath her heels, even the smell of the air felt... alien. 

But that realisation brought with it a second question, if this wasn't where she was supposed to be, then where was? She didn't have an answer to that either. Every memory prior to waking up felt like it was hidden inside a thick fog, simultaneously just out of reach and impossible to find.  
And yet the girl didn't feel panicked, or even worried about her situation. If anything, the sense of déjà vu was giving her something to anchor herself to, something vaguely familiar.

"Getting the feeling this isn't the first time I've woken up in a strange place with no memories. Really hoping that isn't a habit of mine."  
Although the fact she didn't know if it was a habit was a bit concerning, especially when that led to the realisation that she couldn't remember much about herself either. Not knowing where she was from was already bad enough, not knowing who she was at all was way worse.

She spent a few minutes wandering around in the memory fog, trying to find some clue. Eventually from deep within there was a half-whispered word, one that felt as familiar as the clothes she was wearing, that forced back the low panic that had been building.  
"Kat, huh?" She brushed some of her hair out of her eyes and idly picked up the apple she'd let fall on the ground, wiping it on her sleeves. "Guess that's me. Well, I got a name, that's a start."

As she took bites out of the apple, Kat ran over a mental checklist. First port of call was figuring out where exactly she was. Then she'd have to find shelter and a steady source of food, random falling sky apples probably weren't something to rely on. Once those were taken care of, then she'd allow herself to start worrying about her missing memories.

"Well, not going to get anywhere sticking around here," she decided, picking a random direction. Just before she started walking she found herself stopping as if by habit, looking around as if to check that someone or something was coming too but she was definitely alone... and couldn't remember who was supposed to be following.

The sudden spike of loneliness and isolation hit out of no where, quickly followed by a lance of pain as she rooted around in the memory fog for answers a little too hard. Still Kat managed to shake it off, she didn't have much of a choice. The sky above was starting to darken, night wasn't too far away and she had to find out where she was while people would still be around.

 

Thankfully it seemed that, where ever she was, it was still well populated. Didn't take long for the sounds of people to make an appearance. Kat eventually found her way out of the alleyways, onto the streets. Still plenty of people wandering around and, although none of them were wearing clothes that looked even close to hers, none of them even glanced her way as they went on their business.

She tried to wave a few down but was almost immediately brushed off even before she could say hello, let alone start asking questions. The sense of irritation that gave felt familiar, although she was fairly certain that wasn't supposed to be a good thing.

But before Kat could dwell on it too much, she was immediately shaken out of her thoughts by a new noise, one she knew she had never heard before, a mechanical roaring as a strange metal box vehicle came hurtling down the grey strip that seemed to separate the streets here in two.

While the sight of her clothing hadn't caught anyone's attention, her jumping backwards away from the strange thing as it passed by certainly did. She barely noticed, eye's focused solely on the black painted vehicle as it skidded around a corner and vanished down another street.

"Look at that, someone scared of a van!" Someone exclaimed from somewhere, drawing laughs and snapping Kat out of her stupor.  
" _Okay, don't like this place already,_ " she thought, finally noticing the passerby's stares and snickers. She glared at the closest, a young girl probably in her early teens, who broke eye contact and looked embarrassed, more so when Kat approached.  
The idea was to use this situation to at least be pointed in the right direction of someone who could help her, but that went out of the window at the sudden sound of shattering glass coming from the street the strange van thing had gone. Everyone stopped and stared for a few moments, no one moved. And then the screams started.

Before Kat had even really registered what she was doing, she was already pushing the girl aside and sprinting down the road, grabbing a streetlamp as she passed to slingshot herself around the corner.

She spotted the black van that had startled her earlier, the doors on it's back flung open as it parked outside what looked to be a store of some kind. Broken glass littered the pavement, what was left of the window as a group of four men walked back out. All four were musclebound, short hair, wearing thick brown leather jackets with an alien symbol on their backs. One was carrying a large dufflebag while the other three had steel pipes and bats.

The one with the bat turned back to the store that they'd clearly just robbed, about to threaten or insult the terrified shopkeeper inside when an apple core came whizzing by his face. It took him a second to process what had just happened and as he turned to see where it had came from, he had only a moment before a flying kick connected straight between his eyes.  
The other robbers seemed stunned as his bat hit the floor only a second before he followed, the black and gold girl bouncing off of him and rolling back onto her feet into a fighting stance. The one with the bag dropped it to pick up the metal bat that had rolled near his feet, the three remaining toughs spreading out and eyeing up the newcomer that none of them had heard coming.

"Don't know who you are, _hero_ ," one growled, "but you ain't getting away with that."  
"Don't really know who I am either, but that was going to be my line." Kat countered, taking a step further away from the fallen thug so he couldn't trip her if he woke up.  
"You have no idea what you've gotten yourself into."  
"Nope. But here I am anyway, so bring it."

The three remaining robbers glance at each other, nodding at some unspoken plan before they brandished their weapons. The one to Kat's left was the first to charge, bringing the pipe down with all the force he could muster. He hit nothing but air, Kat handspring back-flipping out of reach, flipping back onto her feet and launching forwards with a boot to the man's stomach while he was still recovering from the swing.

The was a clang as his pipe hit the ground while he barely remained standing. A swing from the bat forced Kat to duck. She dropped to the floor underneath the swing, sweeping the stunned man's legs out from under him, rolling with the motion and catching him with a kick to the side of the skull as he fell. He didn't get back up.

" _Two down,_ " she thought, rolling back to her feet and narrowly evading a second swing from the bat. But it took enough of her concentration that she didn't catch the last thug closing in, and she was not so fast dodging the pipe.

The blow caught her on the left shoulder, the sudden lance of pain and the impact throwing her off balance for a moment, letting him follow up with a straight punch to the jaw with his free hand. The punch was enough to stagger her backwards, her heel catching on a piece of loose pavement and tripping her onto her backside.

"Well, well, not so tough now, are we _hero?_ " Pipe mocked, looking Kat square in the face, matching glare for glare.  
"We'll show you what happens to hero types that get involved in the Ironarms Gang's business," Bat growled as he stepped forward, only to back off again as Kat's legs twitched. Evidently he didn't fancy a taste of the kicks that leveled his friends even if she was grounded.  
"You got me, I'll give you that," Kat admitted, rubbing at her jaw with her unhurt arm, "but if you think I'll let you do it twice, you're mistaken."  
"We'll see." Pipe laughed, as Bat moved around behind Kat so she couldn't keep an eye on both of them. 

Kat growled under her breath, focusing on Pipe's movements while trying to keep her ears peeled for any sound of Bat trying to rush her. Even from behind and on the ground, she could still deal with them if she played her cards right.  
Luckily for her, she didn't have to. Instead of the sound of Bat, she heard the sound of squeaking wheels before a loud cry caught the thugs attention.  
"Halt villains! The Rider of Justice has arrived!"

Kat immediately took advantage of the momentary distraction, rolling back onto her feet and launching herself out from in between the thugs, onto the road surface itself. Only once she was out of the ambush zone did she spare a second to look at the new arrival.  
She wasn't sure what she had expected but the man climbing off of his bicycle, wearing padded armor, helmet and goggles probably wasn't it. The two thugs didn't seem sure of what to make of it either, even as the newcomer finished carefully standing his bike up and stepped forwards, raising his fists.

"Hero Class-C, Rank 1: Mumen Rider has arrived to help!" he declared, looking over to Kat, "you okay, ma'am?"  
"Just fine now." She smiled, checking that her shoulder wasn't too badly battered, "feel like giving me a hand with these idiots?"  
"You didn't have to ask."

Yeah she was feeling much better now it was two on two. Pipe wasn't looking so cocky anymore either, nervously glancing at his companion as the two pulled back their weapons, ready to swing and daring the heroes to make the first move.  
Kat's immediate plan was to bait out the swing and counterattack afterwards. Her companion didn't seem to come to the same conclusion.

"Justice Tackle!" He yelled, charging straight at Bat who took a half-step back and pulled back even further for the swing. Rider's momentum was way too much to stop outside of the swing, so he turned into it and took the blow straight across the chest. And the padded vest.

Bat had just enough time to realise his mistake before Rider grabbed the wrist holding the bat, trapping it between the two of them, before smashing his helmet straight into the thug's jaw. The bat dropped to the floor and he tried to stagger backwards, but Rider kept a hold of the arm and used it to pull him back into a forearm shot between the eyes.

This time Rider let go and Bat hit the ground. He heard the cry of "duck" and caught a blur of movement out of the corner of his eye, immediately dropping into a crouch as the metal pipe passed through where the back of his, very unprotected, neck had been a half-second earlier.

Pipe swore, starting to back up. He wasn't fast enough. Kat had gotten up to a sprint by that point and used Mumen Rider's back as a vault to launch herself at full force. There wasn't enough distance for her to throw another flying kick, so she made do with a knee instead, catching Pipe on his left shoulder.

The landing wasn't the smoothest, her breath caught a little as her weight rolled across her own battered shoulder, but she managed to regain her footing around the same time Pipe did, the thug now nursing a mirror injury to his arm.

"What was it you were saying about us hero types?" Kat smirked, nodded to Rider as he stepped up beside her with fists ready. Pipe looked between the two of them, clearly looking worried now. He grit his teeth, weighed the hefty pipe in his good arm, then hurled it as hard as he could straight at the two heroes.

They both had to dart to the side to avoid it, the momentary distraction giving him enough time to turn and take off running, scooping up the dufflebag by its handles as he passed.

"Oh no you don't!" Kat went to bolt after him, but the sudden blast of a roaring engine startled her for a second time that day. A second van fired out of a side street, almost tipping off of its wheels as it skidded to a halt in front of the running Pipe.  
It had the same black paint as the first van, only this one had the symbol on the back of the thugs jackets painted on its side in red too.

"More of them? We were nearly done!"  
"Don't get frustrated," Rider added.  
"You didn't get punched in the face." Kat grumbled under her breath, but held her position.

Pipe had came to a halt beside the van, trying to catch his breath. Even from a distance Kat could see he'd gone pale all of a sudden and seemed to be stammering something to someone inside the front. Then the door to the van opened and a mountain of a man stepped out.

The thugs from earlier had been fairly stocky but Kat had still come up to at least eye level with them. This one towered over Pipe, who didn't even reach his shoulders. His leather jacket was closed, but was bulky enough that she could guess that it wasn't just height where he was bigger.

"Boss!" Pipe started to speak, before shutting up the moment the man's eyes turned to him, going white as a ghost. He even flinched as the man uncrossed his arms. The boss gestured over his shoulder with his thumb, into the drivers seat of the van, before walking passed Pipe towards Kat and Rider.

Kat grumbled and she noticed even Rider seemed not pleased when Pipe threw the dufflebag into the van, climbed in after and roared away. But they were in no position to stop him, not with the man-mountain approaching.

"Looks like you've given my men quite a beating," the man growled, coming to a halt in the center of the three unconscious thugs. "I don't take too kindly to that."  
"They were robbing a place, I wasn't just going to stand and watch!" Kat fired back, eying up her new opponent. He seemed calm and relaxed, too calm and relaxed for someone staring down two heroes ready for a fight.  
"Well that was a mistake," he chuckled, turning to look at Rider, "she might not have heard of us but I reckon you have. The Ironarms Gang sound familiar to you?"  
"The gang robbing machinery parts and electronics for the last few weeks. Am I right?" Rider answered, keeping his voice steady but Kat could see his arms shaking slightly. Fear?  
"That's us. Now second question, wanna know what we were doing with all those parts? 'Cause I feel like now's a perfect time to take this for a test run!"

He threw his arms out to his sides and his jacket exploded into scraps, revealing just why it had seemed so bulky. Covering his torso was an elaborate metal harness, from which unfurled four steel, skeletal looking arms. Two came from around his back, up and over his shoulders, while the second set were at stomach level.

Both Kat and Mumen Rider took several steps back. Neither of them really sure just what they were seeing as the skeletal fists clenched and unclenched.  
"Now it's time Ironarms, B-class criminal, finally got put on the map," the man laughed, stalking forwards and pushing the two even further back. One of the metal limbs swung out at a streetlamp with enough force to buckle and dent it almost 45 degrees. "Think killing some heroes oughta do the trick."

It was at this point Kat finally noticed the crowd of people watching from the end of the street, back where she'd come from originally. They were slowly getting pushed back closer and closer. She stopped retreating. If those arms could do that much damage to a streetlamp, there was no telling what he could do to a civilian.

Rider had evidently came to the same conclusion, digging his heels in beside her. Even the shaking had stopped, instead replaced with a look of fiery determination from behind those goggles.  
"You got a plan?" Kat asked, already sure of the answer but trying anyway.  
"Afraid not."  
"Well we'll just have to improvise then!"

With the cheering crowd picking up in volume, the two heroes nodded to each other, steeled their nerves and charged straight at their opponent.


	2. Vs Ironarms

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well we're back again. And Gravity Rush 2 came out what is now yesterday for me. Thus far it's been fun.

## 

Part 2 - Vs Ironarms

" _What have I gotten myself into?_ " Kat asked herself way, way too late to do anything about it. She was charging headlong at a leader of a band of robbers that had four skeletal robot arms capable of punching through a street lamp. Her memories were still trapped in a fog in her head but even without, she was pretty sure this was one of the stupidest things she'd done.

Still, at least she had an ally in stupidity, a Hero calling himself Mumen Rider. Although he was maybe slightly smarter than she was, he was at least wearing padded armor and a helmet, what little good that'd do against Ironarms. Who was grinning, his real arms crossed across his chest, daring the two charging heroes to bring their best shot.

Kat slowed her pace slightly and matching her speed to Rider's, the two shared a sidelong glance as they were only a few paces away from Ironarms. At the last second Kat shifted her weight and threw herself around his left side, Rider mirroring her movements on his right. The two dug their heels in and launched themselves at the man-mountain from opposite sides.

Kat noticed he had turned to focus more on Rider and so went for a thrust kicked aimed at the back of Ironarms' head, going for anything else seemed pointless with that metal harness he was wearing, only for one of the upper mechanical arms to block the blow before it even got close. 

Simultaneously Rider threw himself shoulder first at Ironarms' midsection, trying to unbalance the man. Instead he might as well have hit a brick wall, the elbow joint of the lower arm ramming into his ribs and killing his momentum in its tracks, dropping him to his knees and gasping for air.

Kat managed to pull her leg back before the robotic fingers could trap her ankle. She fired a second kick, this time at arm height, with as much force as she could in order to try and pull Ironarms attention off of Rider. The lower left arm blocked that one too, the impact of her calf hitting the metal limb sending a lance of pain up her leg.

It broke her concentration for just a moment too long and Ironarms stepped into her guard, firing a shot straight into her gut. Luckily for her it was from his human arm but it staggered her enough that she was a sitting duck for the mechanical follow up.  
At least until Rider jumped up and grabbed a hold of the robot arm just before it could swing. He managed to throw a punch through Ironarms' defenses but the criminal reacted fast enough to turn away and take only a glancing blow to the shoulder instead of the jaw like Rider had intended.

The watching crowd, momentarily excited at Rider's hit, quieted down almost immediately as Ironarms shrugged off the attack and casually threw the hero off of his apparatus, sending him tumbling backwards. Ironarms saw the opening, and that Kat was still too winded to stop him.

The lower right arm rocketed up and Mumen Rider's head snapped backwards. The crowd was almost deafeningly quiet, broken only by a single person crying out. Rider's helmet had snapped its straps and hit the ground at the same time that Rider himself did.

Leaving Ironarms standing over him, a metal fist clutching the hero's goggles that he'd torn free.

"Was that it? The supposed best of C-Class Heroes?" He declared, turning to face Kat and laughing at the anger on her face. Anger that only got stronger as he crushed the goggles in his fist, throwing the now useless and unrecognizable shards of plastic aside like trash.

He towered over her, the whirring and clicking of his metal limbs cutting through the silence as he clearly prepared to do the same thing to her.  
"What'll it be, blondie?" he said, stepping forward, she couldn't help but back away, "you seem to like those kicks, so how about I break those legs in half. Then we'll see-"

Whatever he was going to finish his threat with was drowned out as the onlookers suddenly roared back into life, cheers and cries of "get him Mumen Rider!" filling the street. Ironarms stopped dead in his tracks and turned, staring in shock at the man he had thought defeated him standing back up and glaring him in the eyes, even as blood ran down his face from a large gash opened in his forehead.

"Don't count me out just yet." Rider warned, wiping away the blood with the back of his hand and raising his fists once more.  
"Pretty cocky looking for someone who just got their ass kicked."  
"No, I'm just doing my job."  
"Only reason you still have a head is it was a glancing blow. I won't miss the next time."  
"Maybe that's true. But something you said did gave me an idea."

For the briefest moment, his eyes left Ironarms', glancing over his shoulders to meet Kat's gaze. And then glanced down, at the man's legs, and smiled.

"Justice-" he yelled, faking a charge for a step before immediately stopping and retreating away from Ironarms fists. The thug spun to deal with Kat, keeping his guard high for another one of those head kicks, only to spot her sliding underneath his metal arms, taking out his knee and dropping him to the ground.

"Got you! Not so tough now," Kat said, springing back to her feet and firing a kick straight into the place where right upper robotic arm attached to his shoulder. There was a definite crack as something in the mechinism snapped but the arm was still moving, Ironarms yelling in range and punching the ground with all four of the steel limbs. The pavement cracked under the force of the blow and his fists kept on going.

Kat wasn't stupid enough to try for a second shot, even with his metal limbs now sunk to the wrist in concrete. She backed away from the prone man. That was the only thing that saved her. He pushed himself up onto one knee and spun to face her, tearing his arms free in the process. Along with four handfuls of rubble.

The first went wide with an inch to spare. The second forced her to dive to the side. The third clipped her left shoulder, making her cry out and clutch the already battered limb.

Ironarms weighed up the fourth fistful of concrete. Then turned and launched it at Rider as he charged, one of the steel pipes in hand. Rider just managed to avoid it, twisting away at the last second and using the momentum of the turn to feed into the swing of the pipe. There was a crunch of metal on metal, as the upper gauntlets caught the pipe just before it could connect with his skull.

The crowd went silent again. Kat groaned. Ironarms smirked. 

Then Rider kneed him in the nose.

The upper arms dropped the pipe as Ironarms' head snapped back, only to immediately grab a hold of Rider's wrist, one of the lower set catching his leg before he could launch a second knee.

"Okay then. Enough playing." Ironarms growled as he threw a, thankfully human, fist into Rider's stomach and pulled himself to his feet. Blood was pouring out of his nose, framing his snarl as he lifted Rider off the ground like he was nothing.

Kat went to rush in but was nearly taken out herself as the robot limbs threw Rider as hard as they could over her head. He went tumbling through the air, before crashing back-first into the side of the black van with enough force to crumple the metal. Two of the tires even left the ground as the vehicle rocked under the blow.

Kat managed to catch him as he fell forwards, but he was out cold. She lowered him to the ground as gently as she could then moved to stand between him and the blood smeared Ironarms.

"Much better. Now your turn, then I can finish you two brats off, slowly."  
"I won't let you!"

It was at this point where Kat had to ask herself what she was doing. She had no memories, no clue where she was and she'd somehow gotten into a fight to the death. Even the crowd of onlookers didn't seem to believe she had a chance anymore, a lot of them turning away so they didn't have to look.

Still, she wasn't going to back down. Not with Rider's life on the line. And he had proven that Ironarms' defenses weren't perfect. He could be hurt. It'd take some quick thinking and more than a little luck, but it was a fight she could win. It had to be. She couldn't believe anything less.

She charged in, veering to Ironarms' side at the last moment. Vaulting over the metal swings, she dropped into a roll the moment she landed, breath hitching as she rolled over her battered shoulder. Using her hands to grip the pavement, she used the momentum to swing herself around and sweep his legs out from underneath him. Only for him to jump over.

"Not this time!" He yelled, swinging down with his right fists as he almost fell forwards onto her. Again she darted away at the last moment, this time with a handspring back onto her feet. With two of the arms punched into the pavement again, she took a chance to fire another kick at the arm she'd already damaged while it was trapped. This time the crunching and snapping of the internal workings was accompanied with a spray of sparks.

Ironarms swore, both from the sparks catching him in the side of the head and that the limb stopped moving. He forced Kat back by launching a fistful of rubble from the remaining right arm, before tearing the broken one off entirely and getting back to his feet.

Kat was starting to tire out, a combination of the earlier fight, the blows to her shoulder and the impacts of repeatedly kicking metal starting to take their toll. But so was Ironarms, he was visibly panting for breath now, unable to breathe through a clearly broken nose anymore. On top of that, losing an arm left a glaring hole in his defenses. And both of them knew it.

She decided not to give him time to catch his breath, dodging around the torn off arm that he threw at her and going back on the offensive. She went left this time, he had expected her to take advantage of his new opening and go right, so now he had to swing wildly in an attempt to fend her off.

She weaved through the swings and managed to slip in a thrust kick into the center of his chest. Harness or no, that had to have hurt. And she heard the same crunching of internal machinery that the arm had made when she damaged it.  
" _And there's the weakspot._ "

Pulling back in time to avoid another wild swipe, she was already eyeing up her next approach when Ironarms decided to charge her instead. All five remaining limbs reaching for her throat. And while she managed to step aside and evade the grabbing claws, the scarf that trailed behind her did not.

"Got you!" Ironarms yelled, as he grabbed the black fabric and yanked her back. Any cry she could make stopped by the sudden crushing pressure on her neck. He lashed out with a kick of his own, catching her in the back of the ankle as she stumbled back and tripping her.

She tried to get away but before she could three sets of skeletal fingers grabbed ahold of her, one taking great delight at digging into her bad shoulder while the other two lifted her into the air by her midsection. She squirmed, trying to break free of their grip, only for a punch straight to her back to put a stop to that.

"Good try blondie, but I win." Ironarms gloated, grabbing her by the hair and forcing her to look dead ahead at the broken into store that had started all this. "Now, as this worked so well on your friend..."

Kat would have been alarmed, would have been panicking, but while she was looking at the building, something caught her eye. Something that pierced through the fog in her memories. Up on the rooftops was a small shadow, a moving black shadow, that was filled with twinkling lights.

The onlooking crowd cried out in horror as the blood-faced criminal hoisted the black clothed heroine over his head, took a few steps run up and hurled her towards the brick wall. Some looked away, those that didn't witnessed a black cat drop from the same building, the strange lights coating it suddenly flaring red as it collided with the flying girl.

Everything went quiet. Silent. Kat landed on her feet, rolling to absorb the force and springing back upright... only it wasn't exactly upright. Below her feet was brickwork. She looked to her left, at pavement, at what was supposed to be ground. She looked up, across the street, at Ironarms gaping at her.

She pushed off the wall, floating in the air for a moment before righting herself and landing back on normal ground. The strange red aura that had coated her faded as she felt normal gravity take back over. The black cat rematerialized out of her shadow, starry eyes looking up at her.  
"Dusty!" The name popped back into her memories.  
"Mrow," came her companions reply. Hearing something so familiar putting a smile back on Kat's face.

"What the hell was that?!" Ironarms yelled, almost venting smoke in rage that his finishing move hadn't worked, "what are you?"  
"No idea. It doesn't matter. Because with Dusty back, I just won."  
"The hell you have!"

He tore up another chuck of rubble out of the ground, pitching it at her with all the force the metal limbs could muster. Kat reacted, almost instinctively, the red aura flaring up for a split second as a gravity pulse shot out from her. As the pulse faded away, she stood, with the lump of solid concrete hovering in the air beside her.

She smiled, letting her powers lift her into the air once more as she stared the stunned Ironarms in the eyes.  
"My turn," she remarked, before firing the rubble straight back. He wasn't fast enough to dodge and it tore the upper left arm clear off the harness and smashing it into the ground behind him.

That woke the crowd up, cheers filling the street again. Ironarms himself seemed stunned for a moment, looking at the missing limb before glaring up at Kat.  
"I will not lose to you! I won't go down to some wannabe heroes!" He roared in defiance.  
"Who are you calling a wannabe?" Kat countered, "and you're going down hard!"

She flipped over, the aura almost blinding as she yelled and launched herself into a flying kick, straight at Ironarms. Only this time she let gravity shift, pulling her towards him faster and with more force than she could ever manage on her own.

He went to sidestep, try and punch her out of the air as she passed. Powers or no, getting spiked into the ground would work. But just before he could move, he heard a second yell from behind and a metal pipe was hurled into his back.

Which meant he couldn't dodge. Kat's gravity kick connected, the force carrying the two of them past the van, over the road, and finally into the wall on the other side. There was enough force to kick up a cloud of dust, form a spiderweb of cracks in the masonry. And Ironarms' harness shattered, robotic limbs falling useless to the ground.

He collapsed to the floor, looking up only momentarily as Kat landed before him. And behind her, leaning on the van, Mumen Rider.  
"I hate you heroes," he managed to gasp out before unconscious took him.  
"Not keen on you either, jerk."

Kat turned away from the now no-longer-aptly-named Ironarms, smiling as Mumen Rider gave her a thumbs up as she approached. Only to be baffled at the sudden deafening cheers as the watching crowd decided to swarm in around the two of them.

While her memories were still gone, she was pretty certain that wasn't the usual response she got from winning a fight. Even Rider seemed somewhat offput by it. Although thankfully the sound of sirens seemed to sort things out, several police vehicles parting the sea of people.

" _Oh now they show up,_ " Kat grumbled, before stopping, puzzled at the oddly familiar annoyance. " _Huh, apparently I've been annoyed at police before. Wonder why?_ "

Before she could think about it too much, she spotted Mumen Rider beckoning her over. He was talking to one of the police officers, no doubt giving a statement on what happening. Only as she approached, she was intercepted by someone else stepping out of the crowd. A woman carrying a microphone, followed by a camera crew.  
"Miss Kobayashi, G City News," the woman introduced herself, shoving the microphone in Kat's face before she could respond, "would you be willing to give an interview about what just happened here?"  
"Uhh..." Kat paused, which apparently counted as confirmation.

" _Somebody help..._ "


	3. Amateur Hero

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finished GR2, would have been my game of the year if it'd come out in December and there's not really anything I can think of that'll topple it this year either.  
> Anyway, good to see people are liking this stupid thing so far. Hope you like talking!

## 

Part 3 - Amateur Hero 

"Black van, with a red emblem matching that of those jackets... Anything else you want to add to the statement, Mr Rider?" A police officer said, idly looking over their notes.  
"No, that's everything. I'm sorry I couldn't get a good look at the license plates."  
"It's fine, should still be able to track it down without," the woman scoffed, still not looking up, "now if you think you could rescue your friend over there, we'll need her statement too."  
"Rescue?" Rider asked, puzzled. He looked over to where the officer was gesturing, face going pale when he saw Kat backing away from a very familiar reporter, with an expression as if she was staring the devil itself in the face.

"U-um, I'm not sure this is a good idea," Kat tried to get out of whatever was about to happen. The reporter Kobayashi was not having it, closing space every time Kat tried to take a step back.  
"Nonsense," she insisted, "this is breaking news. And you're a new hero. I certainly don't recognize you and I know all the heroes that operate in this city."  
"I'm new in town?" Kat tried but the devil with a microphone carried on as though she hadn't spoken.  
"A debuting hero taking down a wanted criminal, what better story is there? And who better to talk about it than the hero in question?"

Kat clearly wasn't going to be able to talk her way out of this one, she was debating if she should just fly off and make a run for it, only to be interrupted by another question.  
"What's your hero name, anyway?"  
"Huh?"  
"Well I'm going to need to introduce you when the camera starts rolling."  
"I'm Kat."  
"No, your hero name, and rank too. There's no way the Hero Association would call you just Kat."  
"Uh, Hero Association?" Was this something she was supposed to know?

And just like that Miss Kobayashi's expression immediately switched from intense and interested to annoyed.  
"What?" Kat felt she had to ask, while simultaneously sure she was not going to like the answer.  
"You're an amateur," the reporter sighed, sounding almost disgusted.  
"Excuse me?!"  
"No one is going to care about an interview with some nobody that's not with the Association."

Thankfully it was at this point Mumen Rider joined the two of them, just before Kat could properly react to that.  
"Ah, Mumen Rider! You'd make a fantastic interview," back was the enthusiasm from the reporter. "C Rank 1, that'll get people talking."  
"Well in exchange, I have to ask you let my friend here go."  
"Done."  
" _She didn't even think about it._ " Kat wasn't sure how but she was somehow even more insulted.

Rider managed to pull Kat just out of earshot from the reporter. At least he had the dignity to look apologetic about the whole thing.  
"Sorry, didn't know she was here. Kobayashi can be a bit... off-putting if you haven't dealt with her before."  
"Oh no it's fine, she only called me a nobody. No big deal." Not bitter, not bitter at all.  
"Try not to think too badly of her, although I can't blame you if you do Miss-" Rider paused, "I don't think I caught your name."

With a clearly impatient reporter basically looking over his shoulder, the hero held out his hand.  
"A little late for introductions... Mumen Rider, nice to meet you."  
"I don't have a hero name."  
"That's fine, I wasn't asking for that. And you're no less a hero as far as I'm concerned."  
"...Kat," there was something about this guy's earnestness that seemed to wipe her earlier frustration clear, she found herself smiling as she shook his hand before gesturing down at her feet, "and down here is Dusty."  
"Meow."  
"A pleasure to meet you too. Now I'd like to talk more but the police need your statement and I have an interview to give."  
"Good luck with that," Kat muttered, making sure Kobayashi couldn't hear, "that Ironarms guy seemed more pleasant to deal with."

That got a laugh out of him, which managed to break the tension and let her laugh too, even if only for a moment before Rider couldn't ignore Kobayashi any further and had to give that interview. As his back turned to her, Kat couldn't resist sticking her tongue out at the rude reporter over his shoulder before leaving to deal with the police.

"At least one person here isn't a complete jerk to me," she commented as she crossed the pavement.  
"Meow."  
"Okay two if we count you," Kat conceded, stepping over to the police woman with a notepad, who looked up from her watch.  
"Finally," she grumbled, "you hero types don't do anything quickly, do you?"  
" _And back to not getting respected._ " Kat sighed, " _Great. At least the goons I got to kick in the face._ "

Giving her statement didn't take long, although the sun was starting to set by the time she had finished. The crowd of civilians had long since gotten bored by this point, especially when the only hero they cared about was busy being interviewed, so they had disperced and the police had moved onto gathering evidence. Which left her standing alone in the street. Still with no idea where she was. And with night fast approaching, still no where to sleep.

"Kat? You're still here?" Mumen Rider asked as he finally escaped from his interview, spotting the black clothed girl loitering by his bike. "Would have thought you'd have been done ten minutes ago."  
"Yeah, well... see," Kat paused, despite having spent the ten minutes waiting trying to figure out how to ask, "I kinda don't have anywhere to stay."  
"Oh." Rider mused for a moment, "I suppose a hotel is not an option?"  
"Not unless they'd let me stay for free," she sighed, "somehow I doubt they'd do that for an 'amateur hero' like me."

Rider ran his hands through his hair for a moment, lost in thought. Eventually he seemed to come to an conclusion. He glanced over his shoulder, making sure the reporter and the camera crews were packing up their van and not paying attention before walking away with his bike, beckoning Kat to follow.

They walked in silence for a block. Kat still not sure what was going on but he seemed to be leading her somewhere.  
"You know it'd be faster if you just rode to where you're taking me," she piped up eventually, "with Dusty I can keep up no problem."  
"Can't. My helmet got destroyed, it'd be unsafe."  
"Pretty sure you took worse in that fight than falling off a bike could ever do."  
"Still against the rules."

Rider didn't look back but he could tell she wasn't pleased with his response. She certainly didn't do anything to hide it, kicking a pebble with a very audible, "hmph." Still he thanked his lucky stars she didn't press further, after getting thrown into the van during that just walking was proving painful enough so riding anywhere was out of the question.

He wasn't even sure why he was hiding the fact he was hurt. Pride, maybe. Not wanting to show weakness in front of a new hero who was clearly more capable than him. Or maybe it was simply just because he didn't get to walk away from a fight too often, to leave after a hard fought victory under his own power. Either way, it was clearly a stupid move.

Almost as stupid as what he was doing now, turning down a street and headed past a series of apartment complexes. Kat picked up the pace, walking on the other side of his bike and making no secret that she was looking at everything.  
"Isn't there a saying about cats and curiosity?" He asked.  
"Maybe. I dunno. If I knew where I was going maybe I wouldn't be so inquisitive."  
"Heh," he couldn't help but smile at the almost passive-aggressive snark. Or at least the frown on her face when she said it.  
"What?" She noticed him looking, "something I said?"  
"Nothing," he brushed it off, "we're here."

Kat stopped in mid-stride, looking at the building that Rider had decided was their destination. Compared to the huge apartment complexes around it, it seemed small. She was pretty sure they'd passed by bigger houses. There wasn't really a yard, just a gravel path leading up to what looked more like a warehouse than anything else.  
"...Why are we here again?"

Rider didn't answer at first, pushing his bike up the gravel and trying not to let slip the way his breath hitched as his back protested. He leaned his bike up against the wall beside the door and pulled his wallet out of a pocket.  
"This is a safehouse. The Heroes Association provides them for heroes operating outside of their home cities on missions."  
"Oh. So you're saying-" Kat picked up where he was going, racing down the path with an almost radiant grin on her face.

Rider merely smiled as he held up an ID card, holding it up to the scanner beside the door handle. There was a click as the lock disabled and he pushed the door open.  
"It's not the most comfortable-" he started to say but was cut off by an almost crushing hug from his companion, who then bolted through the door. 

" _Ow._ " He thought. He saw Kat's strange companion looking up at him. At least he thought that's what it was doing, he couldn't be sure if the lights on its face were eyes or not.  
"Meow." Was that it's way of saying thanks?  
"You're welcome? I have to bring my bike inside so, after you."

Normally he'd make sure to carefully wipe down his bike's tires before bringing it into the safehouse's lobby but, well...  
" _Already broke one rule today just letting her in here. After only knowing this girl for like ten minutes._ " He made a vow that there were a couple of people who could never find out about this situation, they'd never let him forget it.

The safehouse itself was pretty basic looking, plain walls and carpet. The lobby let into the main room, with a basic kitchen area in one corner, a desk with a computer in the other. In the center were some surprisingly comfortable chairs surrounding a coffee table with a TV mounted on the wall behind.

Rider walked through the room into the corridor beyond, trying to figure out exactly where his guest had vanished to.  
"Kat?" He asked, looking through the door into the sleeping quarters.  
"Yup!" Kat's head popped down from above the doorframe and nearly making him jump out of his skin.  
"Gah!!"

He had not expected her to be above the door and it was really the first time he'd gotten a good look at her using the gravity powers. Coming face to face with someone with what looked like red lightning in the center of their face, to say nothing about the glowing white eyes, would startle almost anyone.

"Sorry, sorry," she said, aura fading as she dropped back to the ground, "was getting a little practice in."  
"It's fine," it was not fine, this girl was going to give him a heart attack if she did that again.  
"Kinda wanted to make sure I remembered how to do that right, now we aren't being attacked."  
"Well all seems to be working on that front," he sighed, before moving onto the more pressing question, "are you going to be okay staying here?"

Kat blinked, genuinely confused, "Why wouldn't I be?"  
"Well," Rider looked around her into the sleeping quarters, which were simply two sets of bunkbeds with some lockers for personal possessions, "it's shared accommodation, so I'm going to be in there too. Only A ranks get the safehouses with the private rooms."  
"So? As long as I get dibs on one of the top bunks. Sure beats sleeping outside."

Well that was a relief, Rider wasn't certain what he'd have done if Kat had objected to that. Probably slept on the chairs in the main room, which were not quite comfortable enough for that to be a pleasant experience.  
"Well," he turned away, "I'll let you settle in while I whip up some food-"  
"Hold it," Kat's hand came down on his shoulder, voice suddenly cold and deadly serious.

For a moment, Mumen Rider saw his life flash before his eyes. So he was surprised when he turned back to find her unhooking a kit of medical supplies from the wall.  
"Sit." She pointed at the bed. It was not a request.

He took a seat, looking across at the other bed, where two starry eyes looked back from a cat that looked surprisingly smug for something without an actual face. Kat, who had realized just how injured he was when she'd hugged him outside, shot him a dirty look when she saw the purple bruises already forming on his back.

Thankfully nothing seemed to be broken, his padded armor had done its job, so there was little she actually needed to do, just clean up a few of the other scrapes and cuts.  
"There's ice in the freezer," Rider suggested as she finished with the gash on his head, "I was going to jury rig an ice pack."  
"You're still stupid."  
"Not going to deny that. But you got hurt too, how's your shoulder?"

She deflated a little at that. Especially when he didn't seem to be intentionally turning things on her, he looked genuinely concerned.  
"Nothing's broken, just going to have a bruise tomorrow."  
"Well there's more than enough ice for both of us," he said, pulling a shirt out of his locker.  
"Think I'll take you up on that."

Any further talk was cut off by a sudden growling coming from Kat's stomach. Dusty perked his head up from where he'd been sleeping on a pillow at the noise. Rider could only stare at just the sheer volume of the noise. Until a second growl came from his own stomach that was almost as loud. Almost.

"Well, I guess that fight took it out of us," Kat laughed.  
"Hero work'll do that. I'll get some dinner ready, why don't you hit the bath while I'm at it?" he pointed to a door down the hallway, "or there's a shower in the next room along."  
"Can't remember the last time I had a decent bath." She agreed.

Rider had moved back into the kitchen and was trying to figure out what to make when he realized something he'd forgot to mention, shooting back into the hallway.  
"Kat, the hot water takes a minute to work-"  
"Gyaaa!"  
"Too late..."


	4. First Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not really much I can add here but thanks for sticking with me during these introductory chapters. Now I can start on some of the really fun stuff.  
> Also hope you like italics!

## Part 4 - First Night

If Kat had been upset about the late warning about the water, it didn't last very long once she got out of the bath. She walked into the main room, clad in some slightly too big Heroes Association gear Rider had managed to find and any grumbling stopped the moment she saw food.

If it hadn't been for the lack of red aura, Rider would have been convinced she used her powers with the speed she bolted across the room and into a chair. She made it through half of her plate before she slowed down enough to even ask what she was eating.  
"Omelette rice, there's some chicken I had left over from this morning in there too. Sorry it's nothing fancy."  
"Don't be sorry, this stuff is delicious." She waved a fork at him, "best food I can remember having."  
"Now you're exaggerating." She really wasn't. This beat that one apple she woke up to. To the point where she'd probably have to think twice before throwing it at a goon to start a fight.

Dusty meanwhile, seemed pretty happy with the last of the chicken. Which was fortunate, Rider had no idea where he'd find a place selling cat food at this late hour if that hadn't worked. He himself had finished eating before Kat had shown up, so he made a head start on the washing up.

He'd stayed in the safehouse long enough that he knew the tap on the sink would spray everywhere if he wasn't careful, but he tripped it anyway and got a laugh and a smug grin out of his houseguest.  
"So it's not just me the water here hates."  
"Apparently not." He wiped water droplets off of his glasses, when he could see again he looked up to find Kat with an empty plate.  
"Sorry to ask but got anymore?"  
"...I think there's some canned peaches somewhere."

Thankfully there was. Crisis averted.  
"Wasn't exactly expecting to feed two people tonight." Rider explained.  
"'S'okay." Kat mumbled around a mouthful of peach slices, "I'm thankful for the free food."  
"Well I'm going to have to go shopping tomorrow if we want breakfast."  
"You don't have to do that, really. I'm sure I can manage from tomorrow."  
"Still if I'm breaking rules letting you stay here anyway, might as well commit."

"You sure you won't get into trouble with this association?" she glanced down at the emblem on the shirt she was wearing. The bird symbol seemed to stir something in her memory but she couldn't quite latch onto anything solid.  
"So long as no one tells them, I doubt it. I have a clean enough record I'd only get a warning, if that," he said, hoping he never had to test that theory. 

Strictly speaking letting civilians into Association property was grounds for firing but Kat didn't need to know that. Rider wasn't sure exactly what, but he knew something was up with her situation so he didn't want to put any more stress on her plate. Although with the way she was cleaning it of food, he might have to reconsider.

Although now that he was thinking about the Hero Association, he asked Kat to take over the washing up and moved over to the computer, logging into the Association's system. They would want a report on the Ironarms fight and it was better to do it while the details were still fresh in his mind. It wouldn't take him long, he'd filed enough reports by this point that it was like second nature.

Both Kat and Dusty had wandered over by that point, peering over each shoulder.  
"What's this?"  
"The not-so-glamorous part of being a hero, paperwork," he explained.  
"And you have to do this?"  
"Technically not if there were witnesses, but I like to be sure things are reported correctly." And that the proper people were given credit.

Kat folded her arms, looking at the screen over his shoulder. The text was gibberish at first, but as she concentrated she started being able to make out words and sentances. A dull throbbing started to form in her head so she looked away, which seemed to make it stop. She let Rider get back to work as she moved over to the comfiest looking chair and fell into it, with Dusty laying down on an armrest beside her.

She stared up at the ceiling, listening to the tapping of the keyboard as Rider worked. He seemed like a person who always followed rules, so the fact he had decided to let her stay despite not being supposed to didn't slip her mind.  
"Hey, Rider, can I ask you something?"  
"Go ahead"  
"Why are you helping me like this?"

He paused for a moment, pushing his chair away from the computer and swiveling around to face to red eyed girl and her starry cat looking up at him.  
"You needed help. That's really it," was his answer  
"Really?"  
"Really. I became a hero to help people after all. You needed help and this is what I can do to assist. Why do you ask?"

With that, Kat came to a decision. She brushed hair out of her eyes as she sat up, looked Rider straight into his own and started to explain her situation. About how she woke up under a tree alone with no memories and that everything felt strange and unfamiliar to her. She even admitted how she'd reacted the first time she'd heard the van.

Rider himself just sat and listened quietly, letting Kat get that off of her chest. Only when she was finished did he finally say anything.  
"So nothing but a name," he mused, running his hands though his hair again while lost in thought.  
"No," she confirmed, "couldn't remember I even had gravity powers until Dusty showed up-"  
"Meow..."  
"I mean I felt like something was missing!" Kat added in a hurry, not wanting to deal with an angry feline, "I just couldn't remember exactly what. It makes my head hurt whenever I try."

Mumen Rider hadn't really dealt with someone with memory issues like that before, the closest thing was an old lady with dementia that lived in his neighborhood who'd get lost whenever she went shopping and would need guiding home. The only other thing that came to mind was the survivors of the A City disaster that'd lost or repressed memories from trauma. But even that didn't sound like what Kat appeared to be suffering from.

"Sorry," he sighed, "I don't think I'll be much help fixing that."  
"No," Kat shook her head, "I didn't tell you because I expected you to fix it. I just want you to know what's going on, so you don't think I'm an idiot when I don't know things like about this Heroes Association."  
"Ah. Well in that case, I'll be happy to explain anything you want to ask about."

He was not expecting the reaction to that he got. She switched from despondent to almost beaming, to literally glowing when she fired up the gravity powers and flew into a hug. One that she released almost immediately when he winced in pain.  
"Sorry. Got a little carried away."

Any further conversation was cut off by a loud beeping coming from Rider's pocket, Kat tilting her head as he pulled out a small object and flipped it open.  
"Phone," he explained, noticing the look of confusion, "a friend of mine's sent me a message."  
"Oh okay." It was probably personal, and reading seemed to give her a headache anyway, so Kat moved back to her chair.

" _Hey Rider, why didn't you let us know you were in town? You're on the news. Not avoiding us are you?_ " The text read, a second one immediately popping up and adding " _PS, who's the cutie?_ "  
"...That's going to be trouble," he sighed and flipped the phone shut.  
"Huh?" Kat looked over.  
"Apparently the news about us is on," he said, deciding not to mention the second part. That was a problem for another day.

Kat apparently decided she wanted to see, although she did have to hand the remote over to Rider after trying to figure out which of the buttons on it made the TV go.  
"Are you sure?" He asked, turning the TV on and flipping through the channels, "you seemed pretty irritated about this interview."  
"Well I'm just curious what you said, is all," Kat shrugged, "and so I can give that reporter a piece of my mind next time."  
"Not a good idea. You won't win."  
"Just watch me." She grinned, a devious predatory smirk.

 _"-leading to the arrest of the gang's ringleader, the B Rank criminal Ironarms,"_ came the voice of the source of Kat's ire, the reporter Kobayashi talking over images of the gang members being loaded into a police van. _"With me now is C-class Hero, Mumen Rider. How are you feeling after that victory?"  
"Pretty good,"_ the past Rider lied, the present one wincing as Kat glared at him. Her memory about his back seemed to be working just fine.

_"You normally operate out of Z City, don't you? Are you planning to relocate to G City, because personally I'd be very happy with a hero of your talents around."_  
_"Thanks for the compliment, but I have no plans to move. Honestly I'm visiting my mother, it was her birthday two days ago, and was following up on a missing persons report while I was here."_  
_"Ah yes, the runaway schoolkid. We reported on that this morning. Good job on that, by the way."_  
_"Thanks."_

"Really?" Kat muttered and turned her glare onto Rider, "is she flirting?"  
"She's nice to every hero she's interviewing them."  
"She called me a nobody." Still not bitter.  
_"Onto what happened." The interview continued, "Eyewitnesses say you came to the rescue of an amateur hero-"_  
"What!"  
"I warned you..." Rider sighed, debating if he could get away with leaving for a shower or making a break for the door, anything to get away from there.

 _"I arrived on the scene after she did and joined in the fight already in progress, there was no saving involved." Past Rider insisted._  
" _No need to be modest. After all, we have footage from the final blow on Ironarms, where you intentionally distracted him to let her get the final blow._ "  
"What." Kat growled under her breath, looking ready to kill.

_"Yes I did throw a bat at him and cause a distraction but that's it. I did not win that fight, she did. She is a capable hero and if she ever does decide to join the Association then I will be giving them a full recommendation to accept."_  
_"High praise from the rank 1 of Class-C." Kobayashi said, looking somewhat puzzled for a moment. "Moving on, one of the members of the gang managed to escape. Are you planning on taking responsibility for that?"_  
_"I am the one who made the call to not pursue them so, yes, I take full responsibility. I will be asking the Hero Association to do a full investigation into the Ironarms Gang and will do anything in my power to make sure they are all brought to justice, and their stolen goods reclaimed and returned to their rightful owners."_  
"Well I hope to be the one interviewing you when you do. Thanks for giving this interview."  
"Likewise. And thanks for having me-" 

Rider flipped the TV off again, looking over at Kat who had gone very quiet. Even Dusty was looking at her, neither of them entirely sure what was about to happen. She stared at the blank screen for a couple more seconds before Rider decided he had to make the first move.  
"I meant every word of that, you know? About the Association."  
"Huh?" That snapped her out of it, getting a puzzled look.  
"This is a dangerous world, and it seems like it's getting worse," he stated, tensing up as he remembered his own experiences with that, "it needs more heroes and I can't think of many as capable as you showed yourself to be." 

Kat looked down at the Hero Association symbol on her borrowed clothes again, lost in thought.  
"Sorry," Rider added as he sat back down in front of the computer, "you have your memories to deal with and everything. But if you do ever decide that's what you want to do, I'll try and help make it happen."  
"I'll think about it." Could she do that? Somehow she got the feeling it was more complicated than Rider made it sound, and with her memories messed up... 

"You really don't need to make a decision, I didn't exactly know much about you during that interview." Rider pointed out, before turning back to her and adding, "I do have a proposal for tomorrow. I was planning to leave for Z City tomorrow but as I did just promise on TV that I'd track down this gang member, I'd appreciate the backup. If you want?"  
"Really?"  
"It'll keep me in town a little longer so, even if you don't want to help, you'll be able to stay here at least."  
"Oh no, I'm helping." Kat grinned, "I still owe him for my shoulder and that punch to the face!"  
"Hah. Well you might want to get some rest then, it'll be a busy morning." 

Sleep was sounding good actually. Dusty had actually already dozed off, Mumen Rider turning back to his report as Kat carried the starry feline and headed for the very inviting bunk beds. She paused in the doorway for a moment, watching him type away from behind.  
"Thanks, for all this."  
"No problem." he waved over his shoulder, "sleep well. I'll try not to wake you when I'm done here." 

Kat plopped Dusty down on one of the lower beds before turning off the lights, scaling up the metal ladder and flopping onto the upper matteress. Taking only a minute to bury herself in the covers, she looked up at the ceiling. She wasn't sure exactly who she was, or how she got here, but all things considered...  
"Think things are going pretty well. Goodnight Dusty." 

All she got in return was a sleepy meow. It didn't take long for her to follow into sleep. 


	5. Past and Present

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well if you were wondering what I meant by things getting interesting, here you go.  
> While I'm going to try and keep to the relatively lighthearted tone of Gravity Rush and OPM, they both get dark in places so here's your warning in advance.

## Part 5 - Past and Present

**???**

When Kat opened her eyes she definitely wasn't in the safehouse anymore. Or in G City, for that matter. Instead of the greys and red of the city walls and pavement, now she stood ontop yellow and brown slabs of stone. She stood at the top of a series of steps, surrounded by trees, lamps, and pillers made out of that same strange stone.

" _Where is this?_ " She thought. It was hard to see far, there was a fog that seemed to be blanketing everything beyond the steps. She thought she could make out more structures off in the fog. There were small lights making it through the cloud, and the sound of people from the town.

The fog thinned a little, and Kat couldn't help but feel alarmed when she could now see that there was no ground at the bottom of the steps. Just empty space, a sheer drop. Looking around revealed that the entire landmass she was on didn't appear to be connected to anything, just hanging in the air.

Behind her seemed to be a station platform, covered by a metal roof. Although what it was for escaped her, as it hung over the edge of the void. Kat looked down over the edge, seeing nothing but fog... and a strange shifting light piercing through from what seemed like miles down below.

She was suddenly very aware that Dusty didn't seem to be around. If she fell, there was no way to save herself. She moved away from the edge, back to the stone steps. There was a rumbling as the entire landmass itself seemed to move, lurching forwards and merging with the main island.

While it made no sense, something about this all felt familiar. This was something she'd seen before, somewhere she'd been. And the sound of a bird's wingbeats definitely was familiar, Kat turning to follow the noise and staring as a woman dropped from the sky in front of her, looking up and glaring at her with piercing blue eyes. 

The woman's appearence was striking, her black clothing held in place with silver bands compared to Kat's gold. But unlike Kat's it left her stomach and collar bare, instead covering her arms and legs. Her hair went from black to a vibrant red as it passed her shoulders all the way to her knees. There was a marking of a winged crescent moon in the center of her chest, a similar emblem to the gold one Kat wore on her stomach.

Everything about this woman seemed familiar. Kat knew her, she was sure of it. But the memory wouldn't come. The woman didn't speak, still glaring with open hostility, so Kat decided to make the first move... only she didn't get a chance.

The moment she opened her mouth the dark haired girl was engulfed in an aura much like Kat's own when using her powers, only this woman's shone blue. Kat went to step back, only for the woman to throw her hand forwards and Kat felt the gravity around her warp, pulling her off of her feet and slamming her backwards into a stone pillar.

All air was forced out of her by the sheer pressure. She could hear the stone pillar starting to crack from the force holding her against it. She couldn't speak, couldn't move. About a second before she thought her ribcage would shatter, the woman shifted gravity again and ripped her from the pillar with enough power to shatter it.

Kat collapsed face first to the ground, rubble crashing down around her. She gasped for breath, trying to force her limbs to move so she could get up and run or something. All she could hear was the sound of the woman's footsteps on the stone, getting closer and closer.  
" _Who is this?_ " she thought, managing to push herself up onto her hands and knees as the footsteps stopped in front of her. " _Why is this happening to me?_ "

She felt a boot on the back of her head. The woman growled, her voice sounding so very familiar. Then she was forced down, the pavement rushing up to meet her.

 

Kat blinked, staring up at the ceiling of the safehouse in G City. Her heart was racing, she was panting for breath. It took her a second to escape the covers of the bed, sitting up and trying to gather her bearings as the adrenaline surge died down.

It was still dark outside, there was no sounds of movement from the world. She looked over to the other bunkbed, peering down at the lower bunk to see the sleeping form of Mumen Rider. He seemed to be sleeping curled up on his side, with Dusty having moved to where the covers bunched up in front of his stomach.

Even if Kat knew she was safe now, whatever the hell that experience had been was over, she couldn't quite calm down just yet. She rolled over the side of the bed, dropping onto her feet as quietly as possible. Neither the hero or the cat stirred as she snuck over to the door and slipped through.

She couldn't help but peek into every other room, just to try and settle the nerves. It didn't work, the dark empty spaces suddenly seeming a lot more threatening than they had only a few hours earlier. She found herself tugging the loose sleeves of the Heroes Association shirt she wore up, keeping her hands free just in case.

"What is wrong with me?" She asked herself, staring into her own reflection in the bathroom mirror. Splashing cold water into her face from the sink, she was starting to calm until the glimpse of black in the mirror sent another spike of fear through here. She spun, raising fists, only to feel very stupid when she saw it was just her black outfit hanging up to dry over the bath.

"It was just a dream, no need to be so jumpy," she tried to convince herself, spotting her gold bands on top of a cabinet, eyeing the sun symbol. It was definitely similar in design to the red and black haired woman's markings. And she had used gravity powers too. That couldn't be coincidence.

Kat splashed more cold water onto her face, the chill forcing the thoughts to stop. She wasn't going to get anywhere dwelling on it. Especially not in the middle of the night. Leaving the bathroom, she found her way back into the main room and collapsed into her chair, leaning her head back and staring up at the ceiling.

The next thing Kat knew it was morning. She was still in the chair in the living room, but at some point a blanket had been draped over her. There was a loud click from behind, Kat half way to her feet before the safehouse's door opened and Mumen Rider walked in carrying a bag.

"Oh, you're up," he greeted her, "sorry, didn't mean to wake you."  
"No, it's fine," she said, rubbing sleep out of her eyes.  
"Bed not comfortable enough?" He asked, setting the bag down on the counter. "Was more than a little surprised to find you in here when I got up."  
"Huh, no it was fine. I just couldn't sleep."  
"Well I know that feeling," he nodded.  
" _Do you?_ " Kat thought.

She walked over to the counter, after a brief stretch to loosen up after her odd choice of sleeping spot. She really shouldn't make a habit of sleeping there or she was going to be sore real fast.  
"Went to get breakfast?" She asked, smelling the ever so pleasant scent of an incoming meal.  
"Well you kinda cleared out all the food last night so didn't have much of a choice." He smirked, chuckling at the insulted pout he got in response, "managed to find some cat food for Dusty too. Plus a couple other things."  
"Like what?" She peered into the bag, before he pulled out some brushes and dropped them into her hands.  
"Tooth and hair brushes. Figured you'd need them sooner or later, unless you like looking like you lost a fight with a hedge."

Kat ran her hands through her hair, noticing that his description wasn't entirely inaccurate.  
"Thanks," she told him, "but you really didn't have to go that far for me."  
"Technically I didn't, you did." There was that smirk again. This time an envelope came out of the bag and was handed to her, "open it."  
"What is it?" Inside were several bits of paper, notes of some kind.  
"Ironarms was a B-Class criminal. Meaning there was a bounty on his capture."  
"So this is?" He couldn't be suggesting what she thought he was suggesting  
"Not sure why they awarded it to me, I'm not the one who deserves it, so I'm passing the reward onto you."

Kat stared down at the envelope of money. She knew she should be happy, and she certainly was, but there was something that needed clearing up first.  
"...How much is this worth?"  
"Oh right. Well let's just say that even with your appetite-"  
"Hey!"  
"-it's enough to buy food for a week, maybe two if you shop at the right places and catch the sales."

Any remaining gloominess from her nightmare faded at that, she was practically radiating joy at having some way to survive. She wasn't just mooching off of Rider's generosity anymore. The only reason she didn't hug him in sheer glee was she remembered his back, there was no way that had entirely healed overnight.  
"Meow," Dusty made his appearance from the sleeping quarters, hopping up onto the counter.  
"Dusty, look!" Kat showed him the envelope, seemingly not noticing the indifference the feline showed it, "we get paid for beating bad guys! Things are looking up. So many goons are going to get kicked in the face, it'll be great!"

Rider had to wonder exactly how someone that didn't sleep well could suddenly have so much energy. But that wasn't a bad problem to have, he supposed, smiling to himself as he tried to calm the strange woman that fate had seemingly dropped on him before she could run out the door and starting fighting crime before she even ate.  
"Easy, easy. How about you get washed up while I get breakfast sorted, then we can come up with a plan for today?"  
"On it!" She bolted for the bathroom, only to reappear a moment later to grab the hair and toothbrushes before vanishing again.

Dusty meanwhile had found the can of cat food, looking between it and Rider expectantly.  
"Okay, you first. I swear the two of you are bottomless."  
"Meow."  
"That wasn't a denial." He noted, suddenly very glad that he'd saved his food budget with that bounty envelope.

"Okay," Kat nodded at her reflection as she slid her hair band into place. A final adjustment to her scarf and she was looking like herself again. A far cry from the tired, afraid mess from the night. Just wearing her gear again made her feel more confident.  
"Even if that woman does show up. I've got Dusty, and Rider's not bad in a fight. We can take her," she told herself. "And then I can get some answers out of her."

But before that, her stomach growled and reminded her that something else needed to be taken care of. Breakfast didn't take long, Rider finding himself baffled at how Kat somehow managed to put away triple what he did and she would probably have kept going had he not stopped her. He was tempted to rethink his estimate on how long Kat's money would last, if she kept that up it might not even make the whole week.

"So what's the plan for tracking down this gang?" Kat asked, sitting down on one of the beds as Rider rummaged through his locker.  
"The Association got the police reports and narrowed down a likely area they operate from," he piped up, "it's on the other side of the city though. And I don't have a spare set of riding clothes, plus still a little sore, so we're going to have to take the bus."  
"Fine by me, I could use the sightseeing trip. Get the lay of the land and all."  
"True. On the way there's a place I need to stop by. They might have more information."  
"They?" Kat's interest was piqued.  
"A pair of heroes I know. The Ironarms gang had been robbing places for a while so I'm pretty sure they'd have started hunting them by now."

Kat turned around, catching Rider in the middle of changing his shirt. His back was still heavily bruised but the swelling had definitely gone down. It had improved over what it had looked like the night before. She could actually make out muscles now.  
"Meow." Dusty looked up from beside her.  
"What?" She shot back. He didn't look impressed. She tried not to look guilty under his stare. She failed miserably.

Eventually Rider was ready. As he had only packed one set of hero gear, and that had way too many bits of metal lodged in it after getting thrown into a van to use again, he was stuck in civilian gear. Black shirt and trousers and a brown jacket looked close enough to his normal look that he was still somewhat recognizable, which at least meant Kat wouldn't stand out too much. Which was going to be important if they were going to challenge the Ironarms gang on their home turf.

He threw a backpack over his shoulder, filled with water bottles, what little leftovers there were from breakfast and Kat's bounty envelope as she didn't really have anywhere to put it. They were going to have to get more food at some point on the way back but that was for later, right then it was early in the morning, the sun was shining and people were going about their lives. And they had a bus to catch.  
"Well, better get moving. Don't want to be late."  
"Yes sir!" Kat threw in a mock salute, breaking out into giggles at the look she got.  
" _She'll fit right in as a Hero,_ " Rider thought to himself, shaking his head as the two of them set off. 

Kat was being inquisitive again, looking around at everything in her surroundings and waving hello as they passed people. More than a few people, mainly children, seemed just as interested in her. Or at least the black cat that was filled with stars that was with her, anyway.

"Ah..." Rider stopped as they reached the bus station, Kat shooing away the last of the children trying to pet Dusty, "might have made an error with this plan."  
"Like what?"  
"That," he pointed at a sign next to the ticket stalls, one that read that pets were not allowed.  
"Oh that?" Kat didn't seem worried in the slightest, brimming with confidence, "no worries! We can fly, remember? You get your bus, Me and Dusty'll catch up no problem."

Lacking any real retort to that, Rider went along with it. He didn't have to pay for the ticket when the teller recognized him, refusing to accept money even with Rider insisted. Not wanting to cause more of a fuss, he boarded the bus downtown and took a seat near the back. Thankfully it seemed like they'd just missed the busy period so it didn't get too crowded before setting off. Unfortunately while he was waiting he'd lost sight of Kat. Just as he was starting to hope she'd be okay, there was a thump as something landed on the roof above him. And it didn't take a genius to guess who.

Not that it stopped him jumping out of his skin again when a certain red eyed face leaned down on the other side of the window. She waved hello then vanished again, leaving the entire bus in awkward silence.  
" _Well so much for not attracting too much attention._ " Rider sighed as everyone stared at him. 

It was going to be a long trip...


	6. King Oniscomorpha

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back again. And this time we introduce Kat to some of the other things Heroes have to deal with.

## Part 6 - King Oniscomorpha

When Rider had said that they were heading to the other side of the city, he had not been kidding. Riding on top of a bus had been fun for the first ten minutes but after that it was starting to drag.

Fortunately the changing scenery gave Kat something to distract herself with. They'd passed the residential area the safehouse was in, then through a market district. Kat was pretty sure she saw the same street she'd met Rider in. It was hard to tell when it was full of actual people instead of goons.

She wanted to go explore, every fiber of her being was itching to take off and see everything the city had to offer. But if she did, she might lose the bus. They'd already gone past multiple other buses that looked exactly the same, there was no way she'd be able to find the right one again if she got separated from it.  
"That just seems like a bad design. Bet it causes all sorts of confusion," she had pointed out. Dusty hadn't commented.

She leaned back, enjoying the morning wind as her scarf trailed behind her. The sensation of riding on top of a vehicle, seeing a place she'd never been before, it was another one of those things that she was certain she'd done before. Kat decided not to dwell on it too much, it'd only give her a headache anyway. Besides, there were way too many interesting things around.

Kat waved at a group of schoolkids that had stopped and were staring up at her. Along with what felt like half the street.  
"Okay, we're standing out a lot," she finally noticed.  
"Mrow..." Somehow Dusty had found a way to sound sarcastic.  
"Maybe next time we leave you on top and I stick with Rider."

Dusty did not look impressed with that suggestion. Any further discussion came to a halt as a sudden screeching sound pierced the air. All the people on the streets and all the traffic, including the bus, came to a dead halt at the noise that was blaring from speakers at the top of a pole by the roadside.

"What's going on?" Kat thought, covering her ears from the klaxon. The answer came pretty fast, the siren being replaced by the sound of a voice.  
" **This is an emergency notice. A mysterious being has appeared in the eastern downtown area, the threat level is Tiger. Citizens of G City near the downtown area please evacuate towards the west or southern shelters.** "  
"That doesn't sound good."

It took maybe three seconds before everyone in the street took off running, heading back the way the bus had came. People were even climbing out of their vehicles and joining the herd of fleeing people. Kat stood up, trying to figure out what was going on when the bus doors opened and Mumen Rider came flying out.

"Kat!" He waved her down, pulling his phone out of his pocket and holding it to his ear, "change of plans!"  
"What's going on?"  
"Monster attack somewhere. I'll ask for details," he looked down, concentrating on his phone call, "this is Mumen Rider, what's the situation? I need a locatio-"

There was the sound of an explosion in the distance, smoke starting to billow up over the buildings.  
"Nevermind, got it. We'll move in to assist!" He looked up at Kat, "go, I'll catch up."  
"On it!" She nodded, aura flaring up as she rocketed into the air and off towards the smoke.  
" _Who are you talking to?_ " The Hero Association operator on the line asked.  
"Does it matter?" Rider countered, running after a rapidly vanishing Kat, "any other heroes on the scene?"  
" _Two B-classes, Valkyrie and Sapphire Iris are en route. ETA around five minutes._ "  
"Got it. We'll try and keep it under control until they arrive."  
" _Very well. Good luck._ "

Rider closed his phone, throwing it inside his backpack as he weaved his way past evacuating people. He only stopped when he saw a panicking child, Rider kneeling down and reassuring the kid that everything was going to be fine and to be brave, sending them back on the way towards safety.

Kat was already out of sight. She had the advantage of being able to take the direct path, over buildings rather than around. It was going to take time for him to catch up. At least, that's what he thought. Then he spotted an abandoned bicycle in the road. He didn't have his safety gear, the bike wasn't his... but it was an emergency.

 

Kat didn't really understand what was going on. All she knew was a monster attack was happening. So she wasn't sure what to expect as she shifted gravity, falling forwards and towards the rising smoke. As she got closer, she started hearing the sounds of crunching metal and screaming. She sped up, willing more power, rising higher into the air and finally witnessing just what she was up against.

A car crumpled, steel bending and tearing under the many limbs of the monster climbing over it. Easily bigger than the bus and covered in segmented plates of armor, it looked like a giant millipede. It's antenna twitched, body twisting as it moved over the car and turned towards a small group of people that had been trying to hide in an alley.

Two police officers that had herded the civilians there when it had appeared stepped forwards, staring up at the behemoth that towered over the them. One waved the people to run before both pulled pistols and started shooting.

They'd both fired multiple times into its face before they stopped. It hadn't even reacted, letting the rounds bounce off its carapace like they were nothing. One officer lowered his arms, going pale white as the monster just stood there. It's antenna twitched, it's legs clicked against the pavement. And then it shuddered before a horrible screeching laugh came from its maw.  
"Is that it?" Its voice grated, fear the only things stopping the officers flinching from the sheer unpleasantness of the noise. "I expected more."  
"Then let me try!"

Kat's yell caught its attention. The bug shifting its gaze up and towards the rooftops just in time to catch a gravity kick between the eyes. The police officers jumped back as the monster toppled, crushing another car in the process.  
"What are you waiting for?" Kat yelled at them, dropping to the ground and letting her power fade. "Get those people to safety, I got this."  
"T-thanks," the two stammered before taking off running.

They made it three paces before the monster rose back up. A small string of brown spit fell from it's maw, the pavement starting to sizzle as it hit.  
"You don't get away that easy!" It roared, Kat having to cover her ears as the sound felt like someone was taking a spike to her eardrums. That distracted her enough that she couldn't react in time for it to launch a glob of the acidic liquid over her head and at the retreating police.

She tried to fire a gravity pulse, hoping to catch it like she had the rubble against Ironarms but it was already too far away. She turned, screaming at them to dodge it when a bicycle came firing out of a side street. Mumen Rider threw it into a skid as he turned, using the sudden shift in momentum to launch himself from the bike. He managed to turn in midair, taking the acid shot straight across his back and crashing into the ground.  
"Rider!"

The millipede was laughing again. Sure, it hadn't been its intended target, but a hit was a hit. And it did enjoy the distress on the red-eyed girl's face as she glared up at it. Then the laughing stopped. The human was getting back up, tearing off his thick leather jacket before the acid could completely eat through.  
"It'll take more than that," the man stepped up beside the girl, raising his fists, "The C-class Rank 1 Hero of Justice: Mumen Rider, here to help."

"So you're heroes?" The bug raised itself up, towering over the two. There was no fear from this pair. So different from all the other prey.  
"Of course we are!" The girl fired back, "now who are you and why are you attacking people?"  
"Who am I? I was a scientist that studied pill millipedes. They always fascinated me. The way they live, the way they move. I was obsessed. And so I ended up this," the mandibles clicked, the monster cackling, "the King of Oniscomorpha!"

The laughing stopped, the monster lowering itself again as the two heroes looked at each other. Neither seemed sure what to make of this. So it continued.  
"As for why. That's easy. Millipedes are detrivores. They eat dead and decaying matter. As king, it's only fair that I have the freshest dead food, yes?"

Now the girl looked scared. Or just disturbed, it was hard for the monster to tell the difference anymore. The other Hero, Mumen Rider, he seemed more determined than ever. He grit his teeth and took a step forward.  
"Are you sure you wish do to that?" King Oniscomorpha asked, another drop of caustic spit spilling from his maw, "those clothes don't look thick enough to survive another shot. And I know exactly how fast it'll burn through flesh."

Before Rider could respond, the bug's head snapped back as Kat launched another gravity kick. It fell backwards, rolling into a ball and crushing through some guardrails and a bench on the pavement before unfurling still unharmed.  
"Very well. I wonder if heroes taste better than those other weaklings."  
"You're not going to find out." Kat vowed as she landed on the rooftops.

Rider glanced at his watch. Not much longer now.  
"Kat, don't get reckless," he called up to her.  
"You're not one to talk!" She yelled back, only to have to bolt from her perch as the giant millipede revealed that it could scale walls to and shot up after her. She heard a yell from Rider and immediately reshifted gravity, throwing herself sideways as a shot of acid whizzed passed.

She hit the pavement, rolled back to her feet and kept moving. A gravity pulse tore a mail box and some steel bar railings from the pavement, which she launched at the 'royal' millipede as it leapt after her. The box bounced off, as did all but one of the railings, the last managing to wedge itself in a gap in the segmented armor.

It didn't notice at first, regaining its footing after smashing and cracking the road tarmac from its landing. It certainly did notice when Mumen Rider leapt up and grabbed a hold of it with both arms, driving it further in with all his body weight.

This time Kat was used enough to its voice that she wasn't stunned as it screamed, thrashing around wildly. Rider held on for dear life, but the metal pole was soon torn free of the carapace. He managed to roll with the landing as he was thrown free. But as he stood he realized that now the monster was between him and Kat.

And it was now very, very angry.

"How dare you." It growled, every leg punching another crack into the road surface as it turned to stare Rider in the eyes. Rider stared back, unflinching. He slowly bent down and picked back up the metal pole, hefting it like a spear.

King Oniscomorpha bristled at that for a moment, almost seeming afraid. Then it's head ducked, it curled into a ball. A ball still the size of a bus. Kat flew over the monster, another gravity kick bouncing off its armor as she dropped beside Rider.  
"What's it doing?" She asked.

The answer came immediately. There was a crunching noise as entire chunks of tarmac was torn up, the giant insect starting to rotate in place. It started slow but was rapidly gaining speed.  
"...That's a spin attack." Rider dropped his fighting stance, shoving Kat to the side with a cry of "move!" as there was a boom, debris flying everywhere and the monster launched itself forward.

It almost hit them as they dived in opposite directions. It cleared the distance in a mere second. The rushing air of it passing sending them both into tumbles. The sheer force of it's movement tearing a trench in the road and flattening several more cars as though they were nothing. Eventually it stopped, by banking it's body and forcing a turn straight into the side of a building.

Kat and Rider climbed back to their feet, looking down the street and the carnage it had left behind. And then it crawled out of the cloud of dust, rubble falling from its carapace. Part of the roof caved in on top of it and it just pulled itself free like it was nothing.  
"Okay we need a plan. Any ideas?"  
"Just one, and sounds like it's on time."

Rider was looking at his watch again. He smiled, looking up at Kat. She the sound of two sets of footsteps from behind them. Up from the direction the civilians had evacuated, two woman came sprinting up and skidded to a halt between them.  
"Valkyrie, Iris." Rider nodded.

The woman closest to Kat was wearing all blue, a blouse and skirt just above her knees, even including a blue streak running through her black hair. A sash ran around her waist, attached to which she seem to have a holster on each hip holding water bottles. A silver flower pendant hung around her neck, with a large sapphire in it's center. Her eyes, thankfully green instead of more blue, met Kat's and she smiled.

As for the other arrival, the first thing Kat noticed was her height. While the blue woman was around Kat's height, this one was a match for Ironarms as she towered over the other three present. She had the build too, the sleeveless reddish-brown spandex top doing nothing to hide the musculature. She wore tights of the same material and her long copper hair was braided into a ponytail that hung to her shoulders.

She didn't acknowledge Kat's presence, stepping forwards as King Oniscomorpha skittered towards the four of them.  
"Careful, Valkyrie," Rider piped up as she passed, "it can spit acid."  
"I'll keep that in mind."  
"More heroes?" The monster laughed, "how nice, I'd worked up an appetite with this warm up."  
"Oh really?" The copper-haired woman stopped a few paces ahead of the other heroes, ten meters all that seperated her and the giant millipede. She folded her arms across her chest, glancing back at the group "Iris, how about some water for it to wash us down with?"

If the millipede looked confused, it didn't get a chance to show it as the woman in blue hurled one of her water bottles over her companion. Now her eyes glowed blue as the plastic bottle exploded apart with no warning, the resulting spray hanging in the air for a moment, collecting together in three bursts that suddenly froze solid into jagged ice spears and launched forwards.

One bounced off the armor. One hit an antenna. And the last found a mandible. Another screech of pain filled the street. It thrashed around again, tearing the ice spears free and leaving blood pouring from its head.  
"Not so tough now, are we?" Valkyrie said, maintaining her position in the middle of the road.  
"I'll crush you all, you'll be smears when I'm through!"

It curled back into a ball. This time it revved up to speed almost immediately. Kat went to go airborne, but Rider grabbed her arm and pulled her back. The other hero, Iris, nodded at the two of them and winked.  
" _How can they be so calm?_ " Kat thought.

Valkyrie finally dropped her arms. She stared at the boulder that was going to come racing for her any second now, and just cracked her neck. She rose a foot and stomped it to the ground, the already damaged tarmac exploding into a small crater and the sole of her boot disintegrating from the force. She repeated the process with the other boot and then there was the boom.

The millipede fired forwards, bearing straight down on the unmoving hero. Who just threw her arms up as it collided. Kat flinched away but, well, the fact it hadn't kept going and crushed them made her look up. Her jaw dropped.

"What was that about crushing me?" Valkyrie laughed. The boulder had managed to push her back to almost level with the other heroes but she had otherwise stopped it dead in its tracks. She gripped onto the carapace, letting out a guttural yell as she lifted the monster over her head and threw it into a wall like it was nothing.

Kat stared. Even with most of her memories was gone, she was certain that she'd never seen anything like that.  
" _What the hell is this place?_ "


	7. Spiral Claw

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Had kinda hoped to deal with the entire King Oniscomorpha fight in one chapter but it got kinda long last time so I posted what I had. And then this half got long too. Whoops.  
> I get the feeling that's going to happen a lot. Not a bad problem to have, I guess.  
> Anyway, threw a little something else in there just so this isn't just filler. Nope, important plot happens. And get used to Iris and Valkyrie, they're going to be around a lot. At least during this part of the story.

## Part 7 - Spiral Claw

**???**

_Weekly Report - Summary._

_Seperation of Subject and Guardian proved futile. Some instabilities reported upon interaction with locals. Caution recommended but intervention unlikely to be required._

_The Spare is still occupied by Nevi. The attacks on Endestria will continue in order to act as a smokescreen. The police have no leads and are no threat to the operation currently. Odds of detection remain at zero._

_No sign of failure with the Queen. Only needed minor adjustments to compensate for the unstable memories. Otherwise progressing smoothly, approx 10% of the way until completion of awakening._

**G City - Downtown**

Kat was still struggling to process what she had just witnessed. A person had just stopped an attack that, by all rights, should have turned all four of them into paste. Like it had been nothing more than a pebble.  
"Yeah Valkyrie gets that look a lot," Sapphire Iris' hand came down on Kat's shoulder, jerking her out of her thoughts. "Good job buying time for us to get here, by the way."  
"T-thanks?" Kat wasn't sure if she'd really done much, the monster had spent most of the time monologuing.  
"And Rider," the woman in blue continued without a pause. "Saw you on the news last night." 

There was a loud rumbling coming from inside the cloud of dust and debris that had formally been a wall until King Oniscomorpha got thrown through caught everyone's attention.  
"And it's not dead." Iris' head dropped and she let out a sigh, "fantastic." 

Valkyrie stepped back beside the three other heroes, eyeing the cloud.  
"It's shell is harder than it looks. I'm going to need to get at its head or underneath to kill it."  
"Well I doubt it'll be stupid enough to let you do that now-" Iris was cut off by more smashing brickwork. This time from the rooftop as it exploded outwards, raining rubble down on the group. 

Valkyrie shielded Rider, Kat stepping in front of Iris and catching the rest of the brickwork in a Stasis Field. The two new heroes looked puzzled, Iris herself flinching slightly as the gravity pulse passed through her. Kat didn't let it phase her, looking up at the figure of the monstrous millipede that was climbing through the hole it'd made and onto the rooftops. 

It skittered over an alleyway, brickwork cracking under its weight, and onto a slightly more solid perch of a neighboring roof. It turned to the group of heroes, a few segments of its body lifting up and letting it tower even higher over them, engulfing them in its shadow. 

Which made it hard to see its face. Which meant that everyone took an extra second to react when it spat another gout of acidic slime at them. Kat couldn't see the angle it was coming well enough to judge what way to dodge, so she did the only other thing she could and fired the rubble she'd caught at it. 

The chunks of masonry slammed together, forming a very brief shield between them and the acid shot. But it worked. The rocks hit the ground, smoking and warping from the slime eating away at them. 

The group scattered in different directions, just in time as the bug launched itself into the air and crashed down where they'd been standing. There wasn't really much that could be called road left anymore, most of it cracked or outright destroyed to the point that keeping footing was difficult. 

Iris and Rider managed it just fine, Kat took to the air and avoided the whole problem. Valkyrie, however, had destroyed her boots dealing with the millipede's attack earlier and got her foot caught in a crack because of it. She wrenched herself free but, with the group all diving in different directions, that left her alone with the monster. Who was very mad at her. 

It used another burst of unnatural speed to ram its side into her, intentionally lifting her so she couldn't tank the force like before. This time she was the one catapulted across the street and into a wall, head bouncing off the brickwork and she fell to her knees. 

King Oniscomorpha laughed that horrible screeching laugh again, bearing down on the stunned Valkyrie.  
"So you're sturdy enough to not be crushed? But I'm pretty sure you'll melt the same as the rest!" 

"Kairi!" Iris yelled, bottle of water in hand. She pitched it as hard as she could just as another glob of acid fired. Her eyes flashed blue, the bottle exploded apart and the resulting spray of water seemed to fly even faster, pushed along by her power. Valkyrie looked up as the water jet stopped in inch from her face, flash freezing in place just in time to block the shot. 

A couple of droplets of slime made it through, Valkyrie visibly flinching as they connected with her arm. She clutched at it, staggering back to her feet as the ice shield in front of her melted away. King Oniscomorpha was still staring straight at her, and laughed harder when he saw she had been hurt. 

"So now what, hero? I know how to kill you now. Your blue friend seems to be out of water bottles for her little ice trick and the other two are really no threat to me at all."  
"Sorry, I decide who lives and dies in battle and it sure as hell isn't us, cockroach," Valkyrie spat. 

Kat hung in the air, not sure what to do. The monster hadn't been entirely wrong, Gravity Kicks just bounced off and there wasn't anything sharp enough around to throw even if she did get a lucky shot off again. But she couldn't do nothing. She looked below her, at Sapphire Iris and Mumen Rider. They seemed just as powerless as she was, and yet they weren't giving up either, the two seeming to be communicating something between them as Rider dropped the backpack he had slung over his shoulder to the ground. 

Rider looked up at her, their eyes meeting and Kat could see the determination in them. He nodded towards the bus-sized monster, mouthing the words "stall them," before giving a thumbs up. 

Well apparently he had a plan. So she did what was asked of her, gathering her power and launching another Gravity Kick. So what if it wouldn't do any damage? It was the only option she had. She'd aimed for its head but it turned before impact and took it on the carapace again. She bounced off, landing on a roof and flying back into the air as it tried to catch its balance. 

But it was enough for Valkyrie to charge forward. With it reared up, she couldn't reach its head, so she instead grabbed one of the many, many legs. And tore it off. She barely made it out from underneath, nearly getting impaled by a different leg from the trashing and screaming Oniscomorpha. 

"Ready, Kat?!" Rider yelled over the monster's screaming, Kat looking back as he held up one of the water bottles he'd packed that morning. "Justice Toss!" 

With the millipede no longer rearing up thanks to the leg injury, the bottle got enough height to clear over its head. Valkyrie managed to escape from underneath it, rolling free, as it burst and rained down on the beast. 

Sapphire Iris followed with a second bottle, water coating King Oniscomorpha's entire face and antenna. She held up a hand, the giant millipede staring at her with what Kat could only guess was fear.  
"You won't hurt my friends again. Flash Freeze!" 

She snapped her fingers. The water froze, encasing its face. The monster trashed around, trying to free itself but the ice held firm, Iris practically shining blue as she fought to keep it together. Kat didn't have time to waste, racing up above it so she could get a clean shot rather than risk catching its armor again. 

Kat was going to go for a Gravity Kick, try and slam it into the ground. That'd work. Like the dream woman had done to her. But that thought seemed to spark something, a lance of pain shooting through her head. She winced, closing her eyes for a second to try and gather her bearings. 

She opened them, only to find herself on another of those yellow-stone island floating in the void. She didn't have a chance to look around, her attention immediately grabbed by a large tree. The fact that a plant was alive on a floating void island was in itself impressive, the more important thing was the glowing fruit hanging from its otherwise bare branches. 

She looked up, staring at the several apples that all shone blue. Something about this felt familiar, felt right. Only this time she didn't feel afraid. Not even when the fruit exploded into balls off light that raced towards her. She felt them impact, her gold bands glowing white as they merged with her. 

She opened her eyes, back in the sky above G City. King Oniscomorpha was below, still frozen. And she felt a rush of power as she took aim once more. Only this time it wasn't a kick.  
"Ready Dusty?" She asked.  
"Meow," came the voice of her partner.  
"Then let's finish this." 

Rider watched as Kat had stopped in midair. She seemed to have frozen, stuck in place for a second. He'd just been about to call out when she snapped back to life. Even with her aura hiding it, he could see the confident smile on her face before she turned in the air and rocketed downwards. Headfirst. 

For a second he thought she'd gone insane. Even as she threw her hands out in front of her. Then he saw Dusty materialize, running beside her and seeming to melt into stardust that wove its way around her arms and forming large claws. Kat continued her meteoric descent, gaining more and more speed as she started to spin. 

"Spiral Claw!" 

And then the impact. Dead center of King Oniscomorpha's head. There was a tremendous crashing sound and the heroes had to throw their arms up to shield their faces from the massive shockwave of dust kicked up. 

Rider looked up as Kat came flying backwards out of the smoke, no longer engulfed in her aura. She backflipped in midair and landed in a crouch infront of the three heroes, scarf trailing behind her and Dusty materializing in her shadow. 

As she stood she smiled. Not a cocky one, not a self satisfied one, but one like she had shown when Rider had offered her a place to stay, of pure happiness. Behind her the dust had cleared enough to reveal King Oniscomorpha. Who was not moving.  
"...I like her," Iris muttered, leaning over to Rider, "you weren't kidding in that interview last night."  
"Nope." 

Anything he was about to add to that was cut off as Kat practically tackled him in a hug. Even if his back still wasn't pleased with that, he couldn't help but get carried along by her joy, eagerly celebrating victory, even managing to spin her around. Iris looked at the two, shrugged and got in on the hug too. 

Valkyrie meanwhile, walked up to the fallen millipede. The Spiral Claw had certainly worked. The carapace on its head had shattered under the blow, both antenna had been torn off. Only one mandible was left and that has hanging by a thread. Blood was slowly filling the cracks in the street. It was very, very dead. She gave it a kick for good measure, trying to resist the urge to uproot the one remaining streetlamp and ram it through its head. The others were happy, no need to ruin it with being too excessive. Even if it did deserve it. 

She wandered back to the group, just in time for Rider to pull a first aid kit out of his backpack and for Iris to immediately grab it and start fussing over her arm.  
"Its fine, really," Valkyrie insisted, "there wasn't enough to make it past the skin."  
"Shush you. Just because you can headbutt a truck doesn't mean you're indestructible."  
"I know, I remember getting stabbed just as much as you do." 

She wasn't exactly sure what that was supposed to do. It sure as hell didn't stop Iris from using her powers to pull water from her melted ice spears, purify it and clean the acid burns on on her arm. A set of bandages later, the two of them stood opposite Mumen Rider and the strange girl in black and gold.  
"I suppose we should formerly introduce ourselves," Sapphire Iris suggested, "B-class, Rank 41, Sapphire Iris at your service."  
"Valkyrie. Rank 40." The copper-haired amazon followed.  
"Former professional wrestler," Iris added, leaning forwards and whispering from behind her hand despite the fact that Valkyrie could still hear her just fine, "that's why she's in spandex. It's the old gear."  
"Iris-" Valkyrie warned. It didn't work.  
"I mean I'm not complaining. Have you seen those abs? You can grate food on those."  
"Saki!" 

Iris stopped, looking sheepish under the glare of Valkyrie. Kat glanced at Rider, who was just shaking his head and seemed more than used to this.  
"Aaaanyway," Iris piped up again, taking a half step away from Valkyrie, "as you just heard, Saki's my non-hero name. I ain't really one for tradition so feel free to use that when we aren't doing hero things." 

"Oh," that made sense. Kat turned to look at Valkyrie, who sighed and held out her hand.  
"Kairi. And thanks for all the help. Would have been ugly without you."  
"You're welcome," she shook the offered hand, beaming that smile again, "I'm Kat and down here's Dusty."  
"Mrow."  
"Nice to meet you." Saki added, grabbing Kat's other hand and shaking that. "Good to see you're just as impressive as you were on the news yesterday!" 

"Oh? You saw that?" Kat couldn't help but feel embarrassed, blushing and pulling away from the slightly too enthusiastic woman in blue.  
"Oh yeah, saw Rider here singing your praises too." She stepped over to Rider, slapping him on the shoulder and added, "which reminds me, you didn't answer my messages last night."  
"I had a report to do." Rider countered. Which wasn't technically lying. "Besides I was planning to come see you two today anyway. About the Ironarms gang."  
"Excuses, excuses. Anyway, we shouldn't stand around here. Gotta go call in and report that bug boy here's taken care of." 

"If we're quick we can get out of here before the reporters show up." Kairi added, scratching at the bandages on her arm and catching a dirty look from Saki because of it.  
"I like that plan!" Kat piped up, really not eager for another encounter with Kobayashi.  
"Okay then!" Saki reached under the sash around her waist, which seemed to be hiding a pouch for her phone, "I'll call it in, we run for the car and grab a victory brunch. I'll buy."  
"I really like that plan!"  
"Meow." Dusty agreed. 

" _Saki's wallet is not going to like it,_ " Rider thought to himself. But he didn't say anything. Best she find that out for herself. Kairi led the way, Kat and Dusty following along behind and seeming very excited at the prospect of food. 

Mumen Rider watched them go. If he didn't know that Kat wasn't an official hero, he wouldn't have been able to tell. She seemed to fit in with them easily. Then his thoughts shifted to what she'd told him the night before, which had clearly led to him finding her asleep in a chair that morning.  
" _Hope I can find something to help with her memories..._ "  
"Hey, you coming?" Kat called back to him from where she'd stopped, "we're going to start without you if you don't hurry!"  
"I'm coming, I would like to at least see food before you get to it."  
"I'm not that bad." She pouted.  
"You ate four times what I did." 

" _Those two ate breakfast together?_ " Saki looked up from her phone as the group walked away. She filed that little tidbit away for later. Mumen Rider might have avoided answering her text messages last night about just who this cute girl he'd picked up was, but she was going to get answers eventually. Water manipulation wasn't her only power, after all, and you can't lie to an empath. 

But that was for later. Right now, reporting in that the bug problem was dealt with. And then trying to get out of the area before Kobayashi could show up. 


	8. Kairi and Saki

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another one of these establishing chapters, building on the two new heroes, so nothing too fancy here I'm afraid. So much talking.   
> Still the next one should be fun.

## Part 8 - Kairi and Saki

Kat couldn't help but feel it was surreal turning a corner from the destroyed street and coming face to face with a perfectly ordinary one. Going from rubble to smooth pavement, flattened streetlamps to a perfectly intact bench in between some trees so quickly just seemed off.

It made walking easier though, Kairi stopping at the bench to pull her damaged boots off and continued on barefoot.  
"You taking them with you?" Rider asked as they passed a trash can and she didn't throw the boots in.  
"I bought these last week, I'm not trashing perfectly good boots just because the soles exploded. The lady who makes my gear can repair these just fine."  
"That happen a lot then?"  
"We don't get as many monster attacks here as you guys in Z City and I normally don't have to plant my feet like that so, not really. Last pair lasted a couple months."

Kat didn't comment. But she couldn't help but wonder just how often attacks happened for them to talk so lightly about it. Rider glanced back, noticing she was falling behind, and shot a quizical look her way so she shook it off, deciding to think about it later and picked up the pace.

"You all know each other then?" She asked, "kinda getting the impression."  
"I wouldn't say I know them well but, yes. When they started with the Association a year ago they worked in J City, which is one I tend to patrol through often so we ran into each other a lot."  
"That's one way to put it," Kairi laughed, "and you know us well enough that Saki got bent out of shape when she heard you were in town and hadn't got in touch."  
"Sorry."  
"You should be. I had to sit through over an hour of her coming up with theories. She had a whiteboard and everything."  
"Talking about me?" The woman in question appeared behind the three of them, making them all jump in surprise. Saki cackled and the group turned into a parking complex.

Kat had gotten used to the wheeled vehicles in the city by this point, but she couldn't help but stare at just how many of them were inside the multi-floored building. Rider stepped back to beside her as Kairi led them through the rows upon rows of vehicles. None of them noticed Saki watching Kat in mirrors as they passed.

Eventually Kairi came to a halt by a car, Saki taking out the keys from the pocket hidden in her sash and throwing them over. Kat meanwhile took the chance to get a good look at the car itself, the only other vehicles she'd seen up close were the Ironarms van and the bus.

It was definitely smaller than the bus. It was painted a copperish-red, with four doors unlike the van, had two seats in the front along with a load of buttons and a wheel and things that looked important. Then behind that, connected to the second set of doors, a giant seat that looked similar to the couch back at the safehouse.

Kairi had gone around the back of the car, opening a compartment and pulling out a dufflebag. She dropped it to the ground and started rummaging through it, before looking up at the group.  
"Could you give me a minute?"

Kat was confused, especially when Rider and Saki turned away, the former making a point at staring up at the ceiling too. Then Kairi started pulling her shirt off and Kat spun away, staring at the ground and going beet red in the process.  
"Saki, I can see you looking in the mirrors." Kairi called.  
"No fun, no fun at all."  
"Still looking."  
"Fine," there was a disappointed huff, "see, better?"  
" _Heroes are weird._ " Kat decided. Dusty seemed to agree, looking very unimpressed from his place by her feet.

Kairi thankfully didn't take long to change, now clad in a casual shirt and slacks. She'd replaced her wrecked boots with some shoes and pulled a jacket out of the backseat.  
"I will never get over how you'll get changed literally anywhere." Saki pointed out, once she was allowed to turn around again.  
"Wrestle enough places and you get used to it." Kairi shrugged, throwing the keys back to her and climbing into the front seat.

Rider meanwhile opened the back doors. Kat noticed that he was just as red as she was as they both climbed in the back while Saki got in the driver's seat.  
"Huh, could cook on egg on those faces," she laughed, glancing back as Dusty hopped up beside Kat. "Don't forget the seatbelt."  
"Seatbelt?" She didn't need a belt on her clothes, that's what the gold bands were for.  
"These," Rider pulled on a leather strap beside him, pulling it across him and buckling it into the seat. Kat mimicked the action, but definitely noticed the confused looks from both the heroine's in the front.

Still neither of them decided to ask further. Kat leant so she could see around the front seat as Saki turned the car on and they started moving. Being inside a vehicle felt a lot different than riding on the roof of one. Especially when they made it out of the parking lot and onto the roads. There was something almost offputting about moving without being able to feel the wind.

As they drove, the speakers around down fired up again, announcing that the mysterious being was taken care of and the evacuation notice was over.  
"Probably still going to be a while before that road opens again though," Rider sighed.  
"Not really much we can do about that." Kairi glanced back over her shoulder at him, "but one street isn't too bad. Not like another abandoned zone'll spring up."  
"Abandoned zone?"  
"Yeah. We got a couple areas that got hit by monsters real bad a month back. Until they get fixed up, no one wants to live there so they turn into ghost towns." Kairi paused, looking Kat up and down before adding, "where are you from that you don't know that?"

Kat froze. Rider froze. Even Dusty seemed alarmed. There was an awkward silence as Kairi looked between the three backseat passengers.  
"...what?"  
"Nothing," Kat sighed, shaking her head. "It's just not an easy question to answer."  
"Huh?"  
"Kairi," Saki interrupted, her tone lowering from normal and suddenly sounding serious and clinical, "stop digging."  
"Right. My apologies."

Rider seemed to relax at that, especially when Kairi turned back. Kat was still unsettled. She hadn't really had a chance to think about it much with everything else going on but where was she from? The floating town from the nightmare? It would fit the weird vision she had during the King Oniscomorpha fight. But there was nothing that even resembled that here... so if that was the case, where was here? And how had she gotten here?

The fog in her head still gave no answers. Searching was only giving her another headache. She sighed, forcing a smile at the glance Rider gave her. Dusty laid across her lap, giving her at least something familiar to cling onto as the strange vehicle turned off of a road and into another parking lot.  
"We'll figure something out," she whispered to him, vowing it with all her heart.  
"Meow." He nodded, demanding some ear scratches before they all had to get out.

The group had left the car in silence, all of them picking up how distant Kat had gotten all of a sudden. Saki shot Kairi a glare, the copper-haired woman shrugging in response. How was she supposed to know that would happen after all. Kat trailed behind the three heroes, not really paying attention to anything.

Until they passed through a set of automatic doors into a giant shopping center, full of people. That shook her out of it. There were stores everywhere, teeming with life as what seemed like hundreds of people bustled around everywhere.  
"Come on," Saki seemed pleased that Kat had snapped back to life, "there's a good restaurant on the next floor. You'll like the food."

If she hadn't cheered up before, the mention of food did the trick just fine. She certainly wasn't falling behind anymore, if anything Saki had to pick up the pace to stop her from just charging off on her own. The only thing that seemed to slow her down was the escalator.

Even Rider had to fight back a smirk at the sight of Kat looking up and down the moving staircase, carrying Dusty in her arms and stepping back and forth on one step as they went.  
"She's like a five year old." Kairi muttered.  
"Five year olds don't get embarrassed when people start stripping in a parking lot." Saki whispered back, "we could have boiled an egg on her face when you did that."  
"I'm not wearing wrestling gear all day if I don't have to. Besides it'd attract attention here."  
"Because the space cat isn't?"

That was a fair point. Dusty was certainly popular. More than a few people had pulled out phones to take pictures. Kat kept carrying him, which seemed to deter most from approaching. The glaring woman towering over everyone else worked on the rest, Kairi more than familiar with how to look intimidating.

But all the sudden attention on Dusty did cause Saki to realize something important, something she'd forgotten to take into account. They stood in front of the entrance to the family restaurant, looking dead at the no pets sign by the door.  
"Does this mean no food?" Kat asked, looking for all the world like a disappointed child.  
"Um, well we can't just leave him out here alone."  
"Meow," Dusty agreed, no big fan of the amount of people staring at him.  
"I can stay out here," Kairi suggested.  
"You sure?" Rider asked, "I could do it instead."  
"No, you guys are the reason we got through that as well as we did. Besides, it's only been three hours since breakfast, I'll be fine."

Kat thought about this for a moment. Then the fact that she'd get food won out and she handed the cat to Valkyrie. He didn't look very happy about this turn of events but otherwise didn't resist.  
"Have fun," she told Dusty before vanishing through the door before it even had time to open completely with Rider and Saki following behind  
"...that girl is weird." Kairi sighed.  
"Mrow."  
"That's not a denial. Come on, we'll walk around the place so we don't draw a crowd. Think there's a stall that sells fish on the next floor."

It did not take long for Saki to realize the error of offering to buy Kat food. Around the time she had finished an entire pizza, of the same size as the one Saki and Rider had split between them, along with multiple drinks and then asked for more with no sign of slowing down.  
"Where do you put it all?" Saki had to ask, even the waitress had looked confused at having to take a second order.  
"I can help with the bill if that's going to be an issue," Rider whispered to her as Kat received her second pizza and resumed devouring.  
"No, I said I'd cover it. And at this point I'm curious about how long she can keep going."  
"At least one more," Rider said, sounding way too confident in that knowledge to be a casual acquaintance of hers.

That settled it. And, as the two of them had finished eating, he had nothing to hide behind as the Sapphire Iris turned her gaze on him.  
"Okay, what is going on with you two? You two are on the news yesterday, I've been getting the impression you were together all night and now this. She's not a professional hero, and it's never been your style to work with a group before, so something's going on."  
"Um..." Rider paused, as she leaned closer, staring him in the eyes. Kat was too busy with pizza to come to the rescue. He glanced out the window, no Valkyrie to be found either. He was on his own.  
"I mean you're you, so having a secret girlfriend doesn't seem like your style, even if she is pretty cute."

Wait what. That accusation had him pause, trying to process it. Kat looked up from a slice of pizza, looking between the two of them and seeming puzzled at the odd looks they were sharing.  
"Apparently not," Saki sighed, "shame, I could have had some fun with that."  
"What's going on?" Kat asked, in between gulps of soda.  
"Asking if you two were a couple." Saki shrugged, leaning away so Rider took the brunt of the resulting spit take. "That's definitely a no then?"  
"I only met him yesterday!"  
"Kat, she's just teasing," Rider piped up, wiping himself off with a cloth, "she never thought that."  
"But she just-"  
"No he's right. I'm what you might call an Empath. Not an Esper, those are very different and they get very insulted if you confuse the two. And I like not being put through a wall, thank you."

Kat stopped, looking puzzled. Saki sighed and explained.  
"I can sense emotions. Happiness, sadness, anger, that kinda thing. Even stuff people are trying to hide. If two people are a thing, I'd know."  
"Oh."  
"Yep. Works on almost anything with sentience. Basically only androids, the occasional mysterious being, and your cat are immune." Dusty being immune did bother her a little but best not to mention that.  
"...So you know how I'm feeling?" Kat wasn't entire sure what to make of that, which apparently Saki could tell. Which really didn't help the unease.  
"Yup, not really something I can turn off either. Sorry for embarrassing you like that, sometimes I get carried away with the teasing when Kairi's not around."

Kat glanced down at the table for a moment, thinking to herself. Saki could almost see her emotions stabilizing, embarrassment and confusion giving way to an almost fiery determination as she looked back up.  
"Can I trust you?"  
"We fought a monster together, and you did see my friend with her shirt off, I should hope so by this point."  
"You sure about this Kat?" Rider asked, evidently he was aware of whatever was going through her mind.  
"Sure as I can be."

The pizza was almost cold by the time Kat had finished her story. Saki hadn't interrupted at all, the teasing smirk fading to seriousness as she listened. About the amnesia, not knowing where she was and having no where to go. The only detail Kat left out was the dream, of the woman with black and red hair. There was something about her, something that Kat felt she couldn't explain just yet. So she would keep that part close to her chest.

"Well that'd explain some of the odd looks you were giving things." Saki said eventually. "And Rider's certainly never turned down someone needing help. He's basically famous for it."  
"You're exaggerating," he insisted. She was not, but she decided to let him be modest for the moment.

Kat, seemingly reassured that Saki was trustworthy with that secret, had gone back to eating. Even the fact the pizza was cold didn't seem to slow her appetite any. If anything, the discussion about her memories had reinvigorated it. Now Saki could not only see emotions, but also her purse getting smaller and smaller before her eyes.  
" _Karma, you are a cruel mistress,_ " she thought.  
"Saki, while we're here, mind if I ask you something?" Rider piped up, finally having cleaned his glasses from the soda spray.  
"Shoot away."  
"You and Kairi wouldn't have been looking into the Ironarms gang, would you?"  
"The guys you got into a fight with yesterday? We'd been doing some digging, why? You going after the one that got away?"

Rider nodded. "If they have another one of those exosuits then we can't just let them go. No telling how much damage they could do."  
"Fair point," Saki leant back in her chair. "Hmm, we think we narrowed down their base of operations to an abandoned zone. But it's pretty close to here and I'm willing to bet they heard about the monster attack, and possibly that you two are around, so they'll be on guard if we go now."  
"So?"  
"So how about you meet us at Silverwood tomorrow morning, bright and early. We can hit them before they know we're coming. And in the meantime," Saki grinned deviously, "show Kat around town, help her get settled in."

" _Maybe make a date of it._ " She didn't add. If he wasn't going to warn her about Kat's black whole of a stomach, then she was going to have to get payback somehow.  
"Seriously though, how is she still going?" Kat had made it to the last slice of the second pizza and still didn't seem to be slowing down.  
"I have no idea."

True to Rider's prediction, Kat managed to polish off a third pizza before calling it quits. Saki could only look at the bill and dispair.


	9. Plans for Tomorrow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long. ADHD decided it was going to be a pain. Not entirely sure if I like the middle section of this one but, eh, it's too late in the night to worry about that now.  
> Also Kairi and Saki are probably two of my favorite characters I've ever come up with. Next time is going to be fun.

## 

Part 9 - Plans for Tomorrow

The gang found Kairi sitting on a bench back down on the ground floor of the shopping center, Dusty curled up beside her as she munched on pretzels from a paper bag.  
"You guys took a while," she noted, raising an eyebrow at the almost depressed look on Saki's face, "something wrong?"  
"It's nothing," Saki sighed. Co-incidentally, nothing was also all that was left in her wallet.  
"If you say so. Pretzel?"  
"Oh can I?" Kat beamed. The other two heroes merely sighing in disbelief.  
"Sure, they gave me double what I ordered so they're all yours if you want 'em."

Maybe it was knowing Saki as long as she had but Kairi decided she really, really didn't want to ask about the look she and Rider shared when Kat took the offered bag and immediately planted herself on the bench and started devouring the contents.

"You were sitting here long?" Rider asked eventually, waving away an offered pretzel from Kat.  
"Couple minutes. Most people lost interest in Dusty pretty quick."  
"Really? I somehow find that hard to believe," Saki added.  
"Glaring at them helps."  
"Kairi!" Saki paused just before she could start telling her companion off, thinking better of it. "Well at least you stayed out of trouble."  
"Yup."

Cue a couple of the shopping center's security guards dragging a scruffy looking teenager towards the door, the kid glaring at Valkyrie the entire time. She merely waved back, smirking.  
"So much for staying out of trouble then?" Kat piped up in between mouthfuls of pretzel. Dusty had gotten up and moved away from her to avoid crumbs.  
"It was a purse snatcher. Really doesn't count as trouble."

Saki cast a sideways glance at Rider, who was staring off after the kid. She didn't need her powers to know something was bothering him but he seemed to shake it off, turning back with a wry smile.  
"Well all's well that ends well."  
"Well, that's a lot of wells." Kat pointed out.  
"Welp." Saki couldn't resist adding. All three of them stared at each other in silence for a moment before they all broke down laughing.

"...Great now I have to deal with three idiots," Kairi muttered to Dusty, who did not look very sympathetic. Still, as tempting as it was to play the killjoy and point out it really wasn't that funny, she let them keep going and get it out of their system. Even if it was attracting stares that she'd only just gotten to stop.

After that the group wandered around the shopping center a bit. Even Kairi seemed put off by how Kat seemed to gravitate towards any source of food she could find. A small stall selling meat skewers definitely caught her attention, even Dusty pricked up at the smell of cooked meat.

Kat looked at Rider, pleading with her eyes. He sighed and held out his backpack, the other heroes looking confused as Kat grabbed it, rummaged through and ran off with an envelope.  
"It's her bounty money from yesterday." Rider explained, watching Dusty chase off after her.  
"You gave her the bounty money too?" Saki asked.  
"She earned it more than I did." He shrugged, not seeing what the problem was.  
"You're a real softie, you know that."  
"Wait, what did you mean by too?" Kairi had to ask, clearly Saki knew something she didn't.  
"They shacked up together last night," Saki stated, grinning mischievously, "scandalous, right?"

Kairi didn't react, turning away even as Rider started blushing furiously at the implications that Saki was trying to make. And then straight up making. She tuned out that conversation, instead looking over the crowds of people going about their day of shopping. Being the tallest person in the building had it's uses, she was able to spot Kat pretty much immediately thanks to her black and gold outfit. 

She had approached the skewer stall and then stopped. Something had caught her eye instead and she had come to a halt, looking between the food in front and this new distraction. She made a desicion and, after what looked like an apology to Dusty, vanished inside a store. The pair still bickering behind Kairi had no chance at seeing what was going on, but Kairi caught a glimpse at what the store Kat had entered was selling and couldn't help but smile.

Saki had gotten bored of teasing Rider by the time Kat reappeared, weaving her way back through the crowd with a bundle clutched to her chest. She managed to navigate her way back okay, Kairi made a solid landmark after all.

Kairi made a point of standing right next to her partner as Kat approached, Saki and Rider seeming confused at the fact she came back with something that wasn't food. Kat looked a little embarrassed for a moment before handing the bundle of fabric over to Rider, letting it unfurl into a brown leather jacket.

"Your other one got destroyed in the fight and," Kat paused, fidgeting slightly as Rider gently took the jacket out of her hands, "well you've been helping me a lot... hope it fits?"

Rider, for a moment, looked like he was going to refuse or at least question why but thought better of it. Instead he dropped his backpack to the floor, pulled on the jacket. He held out his arms, tugging the sleeves into place.  
"Looks like it fits just fine. Thank you, I'll look after this."  
"You'd better. No more jumping in front of acid!"

Saki looked between the two of them, eyed up the jacket, took a moment to process what she was seeing, then beamed an evil smile. She opened her mouth to say something only for Kairi's hand to clasp over it, the other hooking under her arm and hoisting her into the air.  
"Okay that's enough trouble out of you." Kairi grumbled as she starting dragging a squirming Saki away. "You called in the monster attack, you have to write the report. Now."  
"Mmmnph!" Was the only response Saki could muster.  
"I suppose I have to do one too for that purse snatcher," Kairi added, glancing back over her shoulder, "I'll dig up the info we've got and bring it over later so we can come up with a plan. You still at the old safehouse near the market?"

Rider nodded, Kairi nodded back. Then she tossed Saki up in the air, catching her around the waist and shoulders and slinging her over her own shoulders in a fireman's carry. Making it much easier to carry her away.  
"Valkyrie! I will get payback for this!" Saki squirmed, unable to escape Kairi's iron grip.  
"Sure you will, Iris, sure you will." Kairi laughed as the two walked through a very, very confused crowd.

By the time the crowd had finally hidden them from view, Kat turned back to see Rider had removed the jacket and was pulling out the tag.  
"Those two are kinda weird." She felt she had to state the obvious.  
"They aren't too bad once you get to know them. I've seen far weirder."  
"Huh." He probably wasn't referring to her, although with everything she'd told him she wouldn't be surprised if he was. "So now what?"

Rider threw his new jacket back on and pondered as he hoisted his bag back over his shoulders.  
"Well, if we're planning on getting into a fight tomorrow, I need to get some new gear. Pretty sure we passed a sports store, that should have cycling stuff. After that, why not take a look around the city? I might not be a local but I roughly know my way around. You might see something you recognize."  
" _Doubt it._ " Kat thought, it was becoming pretty clear that the place in her dreams was going to be the key there, but she shook that thought off and just nodded. 

It didn't take Rider long to find gear. He'd had to replace his stuff so many times that he had the various brands and makes memorized. Kat had given him a thumbs up when she'd seen him trying on the new helmet and goggles, the latter still hanging around his neck as they left the store with the rest in bags.  
"Are you sure you want to carry those? Your back's still kinda messed up."  
"It's fine. They aren't that heav-" Rider stopped as Kat and Dusty flashed red for a moment and the bags suddenly weighed nothing. They floated out of his grasp and hovered around her.

"Okay, that's cheating." He couldn't help but laugh at how proud she looked about it.  
"Valkyrie might be strong but she can't do that, can she?" She put her hands on her hips, posing.  
"Meow." Dusty added from her feet, posing along with her. It made for an... odd sight.  
"She can't. At least not that I know of. So much for not attracting attention though." 

The floating bags were certainly getting people staring, which then caused them to spot Dusty and get even more curious. That seemed to deflate Kat's enthusiasm. She looked around, turned to Rider and grinned sheepishly.  
"Catch you outside!" She waved before her aura flared into life and she floated upside down, coming to a halt on the ceiling that became the upper floor before running away.  
"I wish I had that much energy. Especially after eating that much."

 

**Hekseville - Vendecentre**

To say Hekseville was tense would be an understatement. The repeated Nevi attacks on Endestria had gotten a lot of people nervous. Not helping was the fact that people had definitely started to notice the absense of the Gravity Queen.

Two people who had felt her absense very strongly stood before an apartment complex. Or what looked like one from the outside but the moment they had opened the door they had found nothing but ashes and charred wood.

"Oh look, another one burned down. Why am I not surprised?" One of the men, a detective in a rough looking suit, asked his companion.  
"Syd..."  
"Chaz, this is the fourth lead that's ran us around in circles and ended up with a burnt building! That somehow no-one noticed happening. Again."  
"And the outside always look pristine. Our arsonist knows what they're doing."

The detective ran his fingers through his white hair, ignoring his younger partner as he pulled a notebook out of his pocket. Scratching out the address, Syd sighed as he saw that it was the last note he had.  
"Odds on there being no records on who owned this place?"  
"If it's anything like the other three, pretty much a certainty."  
"Then we're back to square one. Again."

Syd flipped back through the notebook, staring into the burnt building as he mulled it over. There had been four sightings of a blonde girl wearing black and gold since Kat had vanished over a week ago, and each of them had led to a destroyed building with no evidence to who owned it.

But every person who had seen the girl, none of them had mentioned a long scarf, or the black cat filled with stars. Combined with the run around trying to trace who owned the buildings, he was almost certain now.  
" _Someone's messing with us. Trying to keep us busy._ "

Probably behind the Nevi attacks too. Not only was that making investigating Endestria almost impossible, it was keeping Hekseville's other Gravity Shifter occupied. The attacks were small enough that the entire city wasn't panicking or forcing the old Jellyfish Unit to resurface but they were coming frequently enough that she was barely getting a chance to sleep let alone help the search.

Someone really, really didn't want them to find Kat.  
"Syd, I hate to say this but-"  
"We're being ordered off the case, right? I heard Bulbosa talking about it."  
"The logic from the higher ups is she vanished without a trace before. So they don't see it as a big deal."

Their logic made sense, as much as he hated to admit it. She had gone missing for an entire year when she had gone down the pillar. But Syd couldn't believe she'd do that again, not without telling someone, not now she knew that would happen. As for going up... no. He'd know if she had tried that.

"Syd," Chaz put his hand on his friend's shoulder, "me and Bulbosa can buy you some time."  
"Thanks," he smirked, snapping his notebook shut. "I'll make it up to you."  
"Uh huh."  
"Okay, okay, Kat'll make it up to you when we find her."  
"That sounds more like it. So what's the plan now."  
"The plan now is you check those records just in case our arsonist missed something, then start covering for me. I'm not out of ideas quite yet"

Chaz didn't seem entirely convinced by the plan, but he went along with it anyway. He said farewell and headed on his way to get started, leaving Syd alone. He turned his notebook over, yellow eyes focused on the picture taped to its back. A photo cut from a newpaper after the Anemone incident. Even in black and white, Kat's eyes seemed to shine back at him. She seemed happy, although the other woman behind her certainly wasn't, Raven looking about ready to kill the person with the camera.

"Okay then." Syd smiled, determination flowing through him again, "if these people can outplay boring old police tactics, let's see if they can predict me when I start getting creative."

Whoever was behind this, they had no idea who they were messing with.

**G-City - Safehouse**

Mumen Rider looked up from cleaning the wheels of his bicycle at the knocking on the door. Both Dusty and Kat's heads peeked from around their comfy chair in the main room as he went to open the door.  
"Kairi!" Kat waved as she recognized the copper-haired woman entering, "Saki here too?"  
"No, you're safe for the moment. Managed to distract her and slip away."

Kat didn't quite get the joke, but Rider couldn't help but chuckle as he shut the door. Kairi kicked off her shoes and moved into the main room, cocking an eye at the sight of Kat in the red Heroes Association shirt as she dropped a bag onto the coffee table.  
"My stuff's in the wash," Kat explained, noticing the look.  
"And you don't have any casual clothes of your own?"  
"Saki didn't tell you?"  
"Saki might not seem it but she doesn't tend to gossip. Why, what was she supposed to tell me?"

Rider made drinks while Kat gave Kairi the rundown of her missing memories. Like Saki earlier, Kairi didn't ask many questions. When Kat was done, she leaned back on the coach and stared up at the ceiling for a moment.  
"That explains a lot. So you got a plan for when Rider has to go back to Z City?"  
"Umm..." the thought hadn't really occurred to Kat. And now that it had, she really, really wasn't sure what to do.  
"One day at a time," Rider himself added, holding a cup of coffee to Kairi's cheek and making her sit up again, "milk and one sugar, right? How about we talk about what the plan is tomorrow, leave what happens after to then."

No one had any objections. Or if they did, no one voiced them. Dusty relocating to the coffee table as several maps and documents were pulled out of the bag and spread out over it. More than once, Kat had to bat his paw away before he could knock one off.  
"Okay so as far as we can tell," Kairi started, "the Ironarms gang is fairly new on the scene, only popped up about a month ago. Between descriptions from witnesses and footage from their other robberies, we know of nine members. Not counting the boss you dealt with, so ten in all."  
"Well they're down to six now."  
"Assuming that's all of them. But it seems a fair assumption, most gangs can't get bigger than that without someone noticing."

Kat picked up one of the reports. She could feel her head starting to burn as she tried to read it so put it back down, turning instead to the map spread over the center of the coffee table.  
"What are all these red dots around the outside?"  
"Those are all the places they've robbed. Here's the one from yesterday," Kairi pointed at the one before turning to one towards the center, "and here's one close to where bug monster was. Fourteen in total, over the last five weeks."  
"And this green circle near the top?" It seemed to be circling an entire district.  
"That's the abandoned zone. One of them anyway, but the other one's way on the other side of the city so we're only looking at this one. If they have a base of operations anywhere, that's where it'll be."

Rider stayed silent as he stared at the map. He hadn't taken Kat anywhere near the abandoned zone during their brief sightseeing trip, sticking mainly to the downtown and market districts. He himself had never been in this particular one, it hadn't been abandoned yet last time he'd been in G City.

"So what's the deal with these abandoned zones anyway?" Kat asked.  
"Basically places that either got hit badly by a monster attack, or got so many that most people just up and left. The city eventually repairs them and people come back but it takes a while, so until then there's just these chunks of city that no one goes. Perfect place for a hideout."  
"Most of their targets are pretty close to it," Rider added, skimming over one of the police reports, "looks like they only just started branching further out recently."  
"Pretty much." Kairi pulled another map out of her bag, this one a satellite view of just the abandoned part of the city, "now me and Saki patrol pretty close to the western edge of the zone so it's safe to assume they aren't going to be there. So we start at the east."  
"It looks pretty intact, lots of places to hide."  
"You'd think but there are two places I think are likely," Kairi pointed at two buildings, "this one is a garage for car inspections and repairs. And the other is a machining factory, think it made engines or something."  
"So lots of tools and parts they'd need to make the thing from yesterday." Kat frowned.  
"Bingo. So we look there first."  
"Which one?" Kat asked the obvious question.  
"Both. We want the element of surprise if we can get it, so we split into two groups and hit them at the same time."

Kat blinked. Even Rider seemed a little confused. Kairi sighed and continued.  
"We all go in at once and hit the wrong building, they'll up and run or dig themselves in and things can get real complicated. We split up and catch them with their pants down and even six of them at once isn't going to be an issue."  
"I guess not. So what's the teams?" Rider asked, already guessing at what was coming.  
"Rider, you're coming with me. Kat, you're getting Sapphire Iris."  
"What? Why?"  
"Both of us know the area better than you two, so one of us has to be on each team. As for you getting the short straw, we flipped a coin for it and that's how it came up."

Kat couldn't help but see the logic in there. She didn't exactly like it but it made sense. She sighed and nodded.  
"You and Iris'll hit the factory, it's bigger so having someone who can sense where people are will come in handy."  
"So we have the garage?" Rider asked, getting a nod in reply. "And if neither of these pan out?"  
"Then we all gather up and start looking the hard way." Kairi finished her coffee and stood, "I'll leave all this here if you want to take a closer look. Meet at Silverwood Library before sunrise, so maybe catch some sleep early."

Rider got up to let her out, Kairi stopping in the doorway and looking back into the main room at Kat.  
"We've done this before, it'll be fine," she said, giving a reassuring smile.  
"I'm sure it will," Kat smiled back, waving as she walked away and the door closed behind her.

Dusty looked across the coffee table at her, clearly not fooled. She leaned over and scratched behind his ears.  
"I'm more worried about what I'll do afterwards," she whispered to him. Dusty had no answers to that.


	10. Vs Ironarms Gang

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we're back. Sorry for taking so long again, the first half of this chapter was a real struggle. Must have gone through like five different versions before I was happy with it.  
> Still not as much Kat doing stuff as I'd like but that'll be for next time.
> 
> Also there really has to be a better way to do italics than html. Because seriously, it is such a pain to have to go and fix each paragraph individually whenever I inevitably forget to close a bracket somewhere.

## 

Part 10 - Vs Ironarms Gang

Rider couldn't help but be thankful that the early start meant no one was around. Because while the hero Mumen Rider on his bike pedalling furiously probably would not raise any eyebrows, the girl flying beside him certainly would. No matter how many times he saw the aura from her powers, he couldn't help but feel unsettled at the red lightning that seemed to be forming from inside her nervous system. It was a startling contrast against the darkness of night, to say the least.

Kat herself seemed quiet. Rider had originally assumed she was having to concentrate to fly but a sudden loud yawn put an end to that theory.  
"It's way too early for this," she complained, floating upside down beside him as he stopped at a red light.  
"At least you stayed in bed all night this time."  
"Sure, until you woke me up. And it's still night! How are you not tired?"

Rider shrugged, the traffic light turned green and he took off again. He decided it probably wasn't a good idea to tell Kat that he always got up before sunrise so this was not unusual at all.

Still, for all her complaining, she had gotten out of bed with only minimal prodding. Dusty had proven slightly more stubborn, Kat had to resort to physically picking him up before he'd move. One quick breakfast of fried eggs and toast and the two had made good time across the city.

The sky was starting to lighten, black slowly turning to blue, as they arrived at their destination. Silverwood Public Library. The building itself was pretty large, Kat guessed that two or three houses could fit inside, although it paled in height compared to the skyscrapers she'd seen in the downtown business district yesterday. But those were towers of glass and steel, this was a reddish stone.

As Rider pulled into a small parking lot beside the building, dismounting and leaving his bike at the bike rack, Kat couldn't help but run her hand down the outer wall. It wasn't the same, she could tell, but it seemed very close to that of the place in her dreams. It was a strange comfort, but a comfort nonetheless.

Kat stepped away as Rider came back, him shooting her a puzzled look even from behind his goggles. Ever since Kairi's visit last night, Kat had seemed oddly distant. And now, the way she'd been looking at the architecture seemed sad and wistful. A far cry from the cheerful curiosity that she'd shown the last two days.

When he'd asked about it before they'd gone to bed she had just put on a smile and waved it off, and he could tell she was steeling herself to do the same if he asked again now. So he didn't. Instead he glanced over his shoulder at the only other vehicle in the parking lot beside his bike.  
"Looks like Kairi and Saki beat us here." He pointed out, "I'm guessing they're inside."

Kat, eager to see the inside, immediately headed around to the front door. Rider paused for a moment, looking down at the starry figure looking back at him.  
"You noticed too, huh?" He asked.  
"Meow."  
"Well we'll have to think of something."

The inside of the library might not have had the same familiarity to it that the outer wall had, it still had a warm homely feeling to it. Warm red colours made up the walls and floor. Tables and chairs were dotted around, even a few beanbag chairs hidden in a small alcove. Just past the librarian's counter near the entrance was a staircase and wheelchair ramp leading up to the second floor.

But perhaps the most striking thing was the massive bookshelves that towered all the way up to the ceiling. Made of a white wood, they seemed to be shining faintly under the warm lights.  
"Impressive looking, ain't they?" Valkyrie's voice shook Kat out of her staring. The copper-haired woman was leaning over the librarian's counter, wearing a midriff bearing version of her hero gear from the day before, looking over another map of the abandoned zone as Kat approached. "Heavy too."  
"To someone who can't benchpress a tank, sure!" Came the voice of Sapphire Iris from a backroom, "Rider and Kat finally showed up?"  
"No I was just talking to myself!"  
"Wouldn't be the first time," Iris said, stepping through into the room carrying a mug of coffee, waving hello to Kat before handing the drink over to her friend.

Rider and Dusty caught up as Valkyrie rolled up the map and slid it into a backpack. Just in time as Dusty decided the exact spot the map had been was the place he wanted to be. Until he wanted to investigate the backpack, leading Valkyrie to have to try and pull him back out.  
"Nice to see weird space cats are still cats," Iris laughed at the annoyed look on Valkyrie's face.  
"Is he even allowed in a library?" Valkyrie countered.  
"Well most of the complaints would be because of potential allergies but I'm pretty sure he's not going to leave fur everywhere so he should be fine. Besides, I'm not telling Hana."

Hana, they explained to Kat, was the head librarian and a friend of theirs. And the reason they had the keys to let themselves in. As Valkyrie sipped her coffee, engaging in a stare down with Dusty the entire time, Iris pulled two small devices out her sash and handed them to Rider and Kat.

Rider seemed to recognize the hearing-aid looking device immediately but Kat simply looked puzzled.  
"It's a radio. You clip it to your ear so we can talk without, y'know, having to yell. Real handy when trying to be sneaky."  
"As sneaky as you can be in bright blue," Valkyrie muttered.  
"Because you're the master of subtlety, Miss Kick-the-entire-wall-down," Iris fired back before stepping around the counter to show Kat how to put the radio on. 

"See, you hold this button here and it'll send anything you say. Now unfortunately your two are older models so their range isn't going to be as good. So I'm afraid you probably aren't going to be able to talk to each other when we split into groups like me and Kairi can."  
"We still going with the splitting up then?" Rider asked, clipping his radio into place.  
"It's not ideal, I'll admit," Valkyrie shrugged, "I'd rather go in with everyone, but it's the best plan we have to deal with both targets simultaneously. Honestly I'm glad you two wanted in on this, otherwise me and Iris'd have to do it ourselves."

Rider didn't respond to that. While Kat certainly made good back up, he couldn't help but feel that there was no scenario where he'd be in any way helpful to Valkyrie. He was no idiot, he knew the difference in power between him and all three of the others. He could feel Iris' gaze on him, no doubt she could read what he was feeling, so he fought it down.

This was no time for those kind of thoughts. He had told Kat that they would deal with the Ironarms gang, so he had to see it through. A Hero should not turn down someone asking for help, after all.

Iris was still watching him, Valkyrie had picked up on it and was looking at him questioningly too. He merely glanced up at the clock mounted on the wall.  
"Shouldn't we get moving? Defeats the point of an early ambush if we stand around talking until morning."  
"He's got a point." Valkyrie nodded, looking down at her still steaming cup of coffee.

She held it out to Iris, who sighed and her eyes flashed blue for a moment, the steam immediately ceasing as the drink cooled enough that Valkyrie could down it in one.  
"Well that's useful," Kat seemed impressed.  
"Says the person who can fly." Iris countered, only not continuing because Valkyrie decided it was time to leave, physically picked her up and threw her over her shoulder before walking out the door.

Not that it stopped her sticking her tongue out at Kat as they went. Rider merely shrugged at Kat's questioning look, he'd gotten used to the pair by now, before heading out to follow and flicking off the lights as they left. Valkyrie had to put Iris down in order to lock the doors behind them and the group moved over to the car. At which point everyone became aware of a slight flaw in their plan.

"What exactly am I supposed to do with my bike?" Rider asked, staring at the car and it's clearly nonexistent bike rack. "I'm not going to be able to keep up if I'm riding it."  
"You could always not take it." Iris shrugged.  
"If he didn't need to take it, why'd you make us come here? You could have come get us instead! I could have been in bed longer!" Kat finally seemed to have some of her fire back, if only because she really had not liked getting up before dawn.  
"Because then we'd have to get up earl-" Iris stopped, deciding it really was not a good idea to finish that sentence. She was fairly sure Kat wouldn't punch her, but she couldn't be certain. And Kat had been able to kill a giant bug monster that shrugged off bullets, so a punch to the face would really hurt.

In the end they had found a solution. Admittedly a rather odd one. The few people out at this time of morning no doubt getting a very weird sight of the car with a girl sitting on the roof and a levitating bicycle trailing behind them.  
"You think we'd get in trouble with the police for this? She doesn't exactly have a seatbelt up there." Valkyrie questioned as she stopped at a traffic light.  
"She can fly, she's safer in a crash up there than the rest of us," Iris pointed out.  
"Logically, sure. Legally, not so much."  
"I'm trying not to think about it," Rider muttered. 

He'd been breaking rules left and right ever since he had met Kat. It was not something he enjoyed and there was no doubt going to be repercussions for it later. But that was a problem for the future, and right then they had more important things to worry about.

Even as empty as the streets were before, the sun only just starting to crest over rooftops, even Kat could tell when they arrived at the abandoned zone. The very air itself felt different, going from a warm calmness to a lonely cold. While the buildings and roads seemed the same at first glance, the overgrowing gardens made it very clear that no one had lived here for a while. Everything just felt empty, it wasn't something she could remember experiencing before.

Ten minutes later, after Valkyrie had parked in a side street and the group had split off, the feeling persisted. Even the flickering street lamps seemed more threatening. Dusty seemed tense too, sticking close to Kat and jumping at any sudden noise. Even if it was just an alley-cat most of the time.  
"Uncomfortable, huh?" Iris said, idly fiddling with her water bottle holster as she walked ahead, "it's somehow worse out here away from the damaged part."  
"Yeah." If the feeling of alienness and not belonging had been bad before, it was twice as unpleasant now. If this had been the place she'd woken up instead of the market district, it very well could have been overwhelming.

Iris slowed her pace a little until she fell back to beside Kat. The woman in blue humming a tune to herself and smiling as Kat glanced her way.  
"You worried about them?"  
"Not really." Kat shook her head, "both of them are tough."  
"Hah! You aren't wrong about that. Valkyrie's the strongest person I know and Rider's not Rank 1 in C Class for nothing."  
" _There's that rank and class thing again._ " Kat noted to herself. "Hey, Iris, can I ask you something?"  
"Well walking around in silence is sucky so, sure, what's up?"  
"What's the Heroes Association like?"

Sapphire Iris paused, mulling it over. Ever since Kat had arrived she'd noticed the change from the day before, and it was a fairly safe bet that this had something to do with it.  
"I like it just fine. Couple of people I'm not so fond of, B Class' rank 1 has a bit of a stick up her ass but apart from that I enjoy it," she said, deciding to just answer instead of fishing for more information.  
"I see."  
"I mean fighting monsters trying to kill people isn't fun but, y'know, helping people's nice." 

It didn't look like Kat was going to give any more away without prodding. She was just staring off into space, deep in thought. Iris kept glancing at her out of the corner of her eye as they walked, keeping a careful eye on her emotions.

Before they had been cold and detached, uncertain and fragile, almost what she'd expect to see from someone with depression. But buried in there was a warm spark that was starting to flare up, the fire from yesterday reappearing as Kat seemed to come to a decision.  
"You think I could join?"  
"Kat, you got an endorsement on TV from Mumen Rider." Iris decided not to mention that particular interview had gone viral and the mystery girl a popular talking point, "If they don't accept you, they're quite frankly idiots."  
"No I meant, I don't have memories, or a house or anything."  
"Oh, that. That is going to make the application form tricky but we'll all figure something out after all this is taken care of."

Kat stopped in mid-stride. Iris paused a few paces later, turning back and looking confused.  
"You'd help me with this?"  
"Kat, if it keeps that cute smile of yours around, we'd do a lot more than help with some paperwork."

The flustered look on her face was priceless. Iris almost wished she'd had her phone camera ready for it. If only to then see what Rider's reaction to it would have been.

**G City - Abandoned Zone - Smooth-Hound Garage**

Valkyrie and Mumen Rider peered around the corner of an abandoned house, observing their target further up the street. Attached to a petrol pump station, the garage seemed perfectly normal from outside. The doors and shutters were all closed and there were no obvious signs of life.

Except that this particular street, and the pump station, had clearly been looted after it was abandoned. Most of the houses had broken doors or windows and the store itself had been picked clean. So the fact the garage seemed perfectly fine made it stand out.  
"Iris, Kat, you guys read me?" Valkyrie said, "we're at our target and I'm pretty sure we've got a hit."  
" _Picking you up loud and clear._ " Iris' voice piped into her and Rider's earpieces, " _Kat, yours is out of range, I'm the only one that can hear you. I know, I know, we'll get some better ones for you next time._ "  
"Focus, you two. You made it to the factory yet?"  
" _Just approaching the last corner now. Big place and... well would you look at that?_ "  
"Kinda hard from over here, there's a whole city block in the way." Valkyrie sighed.  
" _Sorry. Pretty sure there's a light on in one of the windows. That'd have burned out by now if it had been left when it was abandoned. So looks like we got a hit here too._ "  
"These guys really don't know how a secret hideout is supposed to work, do they?"  
" _Nope. Let's go teach them the error of their ways._ "

On that cue, Valkyrie looked over to Rider and nodded, signalling it was time to move closer. Rider leaving his bike against a wall as the two started to creep up the road, keeping a careful eye for any sign of movement. As they passed the looted petrol station, Valkyrie pointed out a doorway before pausing and reaching back up to her radio.  
"Ready to go." She whispered, "you both in position?"  
_"All good here. Definitely sensing people inside but I can't get a good reading through concrete._ "  
"Be careful, don't want either of you getting hurt."  
" _Likewise. You're welcome, by the way._ "  
"For?"  
" _I did my thing. Everything's fine now._ " 

Valkyrie looked over at Rider and mouthed the word 'Kat'. She might not have Iris' empath powers but she could still see the sense of relief running through him at that.  
"We'll leave that for later." She whispered into her radio, moving to the corner of the garage's wall with Rider just behind her. Glancing back, she got a nod from him as the two got ready. "On my mark."  
" _Ready and waiting. Good luck Valkyrie._ "  
"And you Iris. Three. Two. One." 

Valkyrie and Mumen Rider shared one last glance as the countdown finished. While his goggles made his expression difficult to read, the confident smile on her face was clear as the almost-arrived day.  
"Go!" 

The two rocketed around the corner. Valkyrie's bigger strides keeping her in front even as she swung out wide, just so she could keep her momentum as she turned into the door and rammed into it with her shoulder. It had been closed, locked and bolted. And it didn't stand a chance, tearing from the door frame as if it'd only been attached with tissues and flying a few meters before smashing to the ground. 

Inside, in the workshop was a black van. A black van with a familiar red emblem, that of a robotic skeletal arm. Two people, one around the back of the van and another sitting at a workbench, spun around at the sudden crashing from the door. 

They went pale at the sight of the two heroes framed against the light of dawn.  
"The heroes Mumen Rider and Valkyrie are here!" Rider called out, keeping his fists up in contrast to the relaxed looking woman standing beside him with her arms folded.  
"Now then, are you going to surrender or make this a fight?" Valkyrie asked. The man at the workbench reached for a heavy wrench, the other pulling out a knife. She let her arms drop to her side, cracking the bones in her neck as she looked between the two. "Bad decision." 

**G City - Abandoned Zone - Poinsettia Engineering Factory**

Sapphire Iris was a little quieter than her partner. Pouring some water into the gap between the door and its frame, she glanced up at Kat who was standing on the wall by one of the windows. A quick freezing of the hinges and bolts was all it took to break them, a tiny push now all that was needed to make the door fall. 

Iris entered alone, into what was clearly originally a loading dock of some sort. Now though it was littered with machinery and hastily bolted together frames and scaffolds for whatever was being built here. Bits of metal and rubbish littered the ground, oil patches were everywhere. The whole place seemed jury rigged and unsafe, the kind of place that would give a health and safety inspector nightmares. 

Now that she was inside and there was no concrete wall blocking her empath abilities, she could clearly sense three people. Two near the back of the large room, crawling out from inside a tent, still disorientated from the sudden wake up call. The third ran in from a corridor to the left, glaring at her and carrying a hefty looking steel bar.  
"Morning boys!" Iris beamed, "I got a little lost so you couldn't point me towards the Ironarms Gang, now could you?"  
"You found 'em," the man with the steel bar growled as the other two scrambled for weapons.  
"Well ain't that nice. Don't suppose you wouldn't try and attack me and we can just talk this over?" 

The three spread out, making it difficult for Iris to keep an eye on all three of their movement. Not that she needed to, but they didn't know that and she wasn't going to tell them. Instead she locked eyes with the lone lady of the trio, the center of the three, who would almost be cute if it wasn't for the grime and oil soaking her clothes and hair. 

The woman hefted a sledgehammer, spitting on the ground as she slowly moved closer. The group didn't look keen to charge, flinching as Iris raised a hand and tapped at her ear. She stood still, framed in the doorway, and just waved at them to bring it. 

They charged. She snapped her fingers. The window above the door exploded inwards, shards of glass falling for only a moment before a strange pulse caught them in midair and threw them away from the figure that shot through the air, cloaked in a black aura, streaked with red lightning and with a long black scarf trailing behind her. 

The man with the steel bar barely dodged the flying kick, Kat's aura fading as she rolled upon hitting the ground and popping straight back to her feet. She ducked back behind a swing from her opponent, following up with a kick to his shins and dropping him to one knee. A second kick, this one to the side of the head, and the bar clattered to the ground. 

Meanwhile Iris sidestepped a swing from the sledgehammer and fired off a punch into the side of the woman's jaw. While she was no where near as strong as Valkyrie, or Kat, she was still able to put enough power in to stagger her opponent back. 

The third thug approached, this one having pulled on a metal gauntlet. Iris' eyes flashed blue, one of the water bottles at her hip seeming to fire a spray of water on their own that flew upwards and froze into a ball of ice that slammed right into his gut and cut his momentum short. 

From there she grabbed him by the gauntlet arm, sweeping a leg to knock him off balance as she pivoted, slamming him against the wall beside the door. A second, larger jet of water froze his arms against the concrete wall and pinning him there. A knee to his temple made sure he wasn't going to be able to break free any time soon. 

The sudden flash of anger from behind was all the warning Iris needed, darting to her left as the sledgehammer slammed down through where she'd been only a second earlier, cracking a hole in the concrete floor. The woman dropped the hammer, preferring the quicker option and just tackled Iris to the floor before she could recover. 

Iris looked up at the woman sitting on her chest and pinning her to the ground. She seemed about the same age, and something about her brown eyes reminded her of Valkyrie. Iris couldn't help but smile at that, giving an almost-flirtatious wink even as the woman pulled back a fist to pummel her. 

At which point a flying Kat slammed into the back of her head and launched her off Iris. The woman tried to roll to her feet, grabbing a jagged chunk of metal off of the ground, but Kat was faster and a stasis field ripped it away before she could grip it. It and several other bits of debris were fired at a concrete pillar with enough force to embed themselves in it. 

The woman looked up from her knees, at the floating figure streaked with glowing red lightning. The woman in blue stood and patted her companion on the shoulder, before turning to her.  
"Now, cutie, I suppose you're ready to surrender?"  
"S-sure." Anything to not have to fight those two anymore. Besides, she knew something they didn- 

Iris's eyes shined blue as two spheres of water hovered around her. She smiled, winking again at the kneeling woman as she glanced over to the doorway that led deeper into the building. One of the spheres formed an ice spear and pierced into the wall beside the door, drawing a yelp from the person hiding on the other side. 

The fourth person tried to flee now he'd clearly lost the element of surprise, and had only been an inch away from getting stabbed in the back. The second water sphere put a stop to that, colliding with his legs as he sprinted down the hallway and freezing solid, tripping him and pinning him to the ground.  
"Right, now that's all of you," Sapphire Iris dusted herself down, flipping the top of her water bottle closed. "Kat, you mind helping me get these guys all gathered up. Sure there's some rope or something somewhere."  
"On it." 

**G City - Abandoned Zone - Smooth-Hound Garage**

Valkyrie slammed the door at the back of the van shut on the two unconscious goons. She fed a metal pipe through the two holes she'd made in the doors, bending the steel back on itself so they wouldn't be able to open it when they did eventually wake up. They were not going anywhere. Rider came back from checking the rest of the building, rubbing at his jaw from where he'd taken a punch during the brawl.  
"All clear." He confirmed, Valkyrie finally breathing a sigh of relief and allowing herself to relax.  
"Any sign of what they were doing here?"  
"A lot of parts in the repair bay are missing, I'm guessing they were taking them. Look," he pointed down by the van, at a larger set of tire marks that almost surrounded the vehicle, "those seem fresh, they had a truck of some kind here recently."  
"Seems as good a guess as any-" 

" _Hey, we're all wrapped up here. How goes things at your end?_ " Iris' voice piped up, Rider jumping slightly in alarm at the sudden noise.  
"Hey Iris, all good here."  
" _No one got hurt? Kat won't admit it but she's been worried about you both._ "  
"Couple scrapes but we're fine. You?"  
" _Well I might have a few in a minute, jeez Kat, I'm just teasing. No need to glare like that._ "  
"You got Ironarms gang members too."  
" _They got the jackets. Well they had them, I got one now, these are surprisingly comfy._ "  
"Saki..." Valkyrie sighed, "how many? We had two."  
" _Four. So that's all six accounted fo- huh?_ " There was a muffled conversation on the other side of the radio before Iris added, " _Kat says that the one with the pipe that got away from her and Rider isn't here._ " 

Valkyrie turned to Rider, who shook his head. Neither of the two they had fought had even resembled the man who had escaped.  
"Not here."  
" _Looks like lucky number seven is still around somewhere. This is a pretty big building, lots of walls to interfere with my powers, might have missed him._ "  
"Definitely not here. We've got our guys secured so we'll head your direction."  
" _Good. Maybe you can figure out what these guys were making because I can't, and they won't tell us. I tried flirting with one and she won't bite, and me and Kat are both too cute for a good cop/bad cop routine._ "  
"Focus, Iris. What do you mean what they were making?"  
" _There's a frame thing they've made, to hold stuff in place while they're bolting it together. It's huge. Like I could stand on your shoulders and not reach the top big. Way too big for the exosuit thing Kat and Rider dealt with._ " 

Valkrie and Rider glanced at each other. That didn't sound good. Every instinct they had screamed trouble.  
"Get your bike," Valkyrie nodded towards the door, the two sprinting out of the building.  
" _Oh. I think I can sense someone, think I found our missing ma-_ " 

Iris' voice cut off, Valkyrie feeling her blood run cold as she took off at a full sprint down the road, Rider rapidly catching up now he was back on his bicycle.  
"Saki! What's going on!" Valkyrie found herself yelling into the radio, hoping against hope for a response.  
" _Found out what they were making!_ " There was an horrendous crashing sound from the radio, what sounded like smashing concrete and creaking metal. Under it all they could hear Iris moving, almost scrambling away from whatever was going on. " _They got a mech._ "  
"A what?!"  
" _Mech! Giant robot! Big metal thing trying to kill us! And it looks water proof so help would be real nice! Soon please!_ " 

Rider's grip tightened on his handlebars. He passed in front of Valkyrie, letting her hop on behind him before pedaling with all his might. The radio went quiet. But it didn't matter, it didn't take long before they could hear the sounds of smashing rubble and smoke starting to rise over the houses. The only thing keeping the feeling of panic and fear at bay was that, if it was causing that much devastation, it hadn't managed to kill Kat and Saki yet. 

And it wasn't going to be able to. Rider wasn't entirely sure how he'd pull that promise off, but he made it anyway. He was a hero, after all, so he'd fight. 


	11. Typhoon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I cannot tell you how much grief this chapter caused. I struggled enough that I ended up doing two oneshots. And then when I finally got almost done with this, the file wiped itself on me and I had to start from scratch.  
> Never wanted to set my laptop on fire quite that much before.
> 
> But we're done now. And while Iris stole the show last time, now its the others turn. And hoo boy does Kat make the most of it. Hopefully it's easy enough to follow, it is 5.30 am at the moment but I am just so done with this chapter at this point.

## 

Part 11 - Typhoon

The moment Valkyrie had confirmed that the pipe wielding thug from the robbery wasn't with them, Kat knew that he had to be hiding somewhere nearby. A quick glance at the tied-up gang members made that blatantly clear, all with knowing smirks. Smirks that quickly vanished when they noticed Kat glaring at them.

Still, if Pipe was hiding somewhere, then he needed to be found. And fast. While Kat was no expert with machines, even she knew the giant metal scaffold meant that they had been building something big. And there was no way that was good. She passed through the door opposite the entrance and headed deeper into the building with Sapphire Iris following behind.

The next room was almost as large as the loading dock. And filled with non-moving conveyor belts and large work tables. It looked like originally they had been in lines across the entire room but the gang seemed to have moved them to clear a path straight down the middle. Why, Kat didn’t know.

Just as Iris suddenly looked up, starting to say she'd sensed something, Kat heard a door slamming further inside. She took off running, Iris behind, and ran into another of those large steel shutters like those on the garage doors. And beside it a perfectly normal, wooden door that was still shuddering from being slammed.

She glanced at Dusty before firing up her powers and Gravity Kicking the door straight off of its hinges, despite the filing cabinets that had been tossed behind it as a makeshift barricade. Kat immediately went to try and find where Pipe had gone, only to figure it out immediately.

The giant metal machine was hard to miss. Standing at least three times Kat's height and wider than a bus. Absolutely covered in black-painted armor, it looked more like a walking coffin than a person, with it's rectangular torso and lack of anything resembling a head. It's legs were easily the size of tree trunks, and while the left arm seemed like a much bigger version of the ones from Ironarms' exosuit, the other seemed to be just a giant slab of metal past the elbow.

A loud rumbling noise started from somewhere inside it, two sets of spotlights mounted on where shoulders should be firing up and almost blinding Kat and Iris. The rumbling turned into a roar. And the machine started to move.  
"Found what they were making!" Iris yelled into her earpiece as she grabbed Kat by the arm and hauled them back through the door. "They got a mech."

  


They made it three paces before that entire wall exploded outwards. Anything Iris was saying drowned out in the crashing of stone as the two heroes dived in separate directions. Kat took to the air, flying over the worst of the debris and throwing some of it back at the mech with a stasis field.

While it didn't seem to do any damage, not even denting the armor plating, the flying rubble definitely caught its attention. For something so large and heavy, it moved surprisingly quickly, charging forwards and backing Kat towards the outer wall before trying to swipe her out of the sky with it's humanlike arm. She barely managed to avoid it, watching it smash through the concrete wall as though it were paper.

While there was now a hole big enough for her to escape outside, where she would have a lot more room to fly, that didn't help Iris. Who, thankfully, was making a beeline for the exit. So all Kat had to do was keep its attention a little longer.  
"Easy!" A gravity kick straight in the center of its torso, where she guessed the cockpit was, staggered it backwards and making it crush conveyer belts and machinery into dust under its feet.

Still the machine was well designed enough that it was able to keep its footing, righting itself and charging straight back at her. Now that Iris was clear, Kat shot through the nice hole in the wall it had made for her and gained as much height as she could.

She cleared the rooftop just as the remaining wall toppled outwards in one solid chunk. The mech stepped out into the open. For a moment it seemed like it hadn't seen where she'd gone, but then it's human-like arm grabbed ahold of the toppled wall and it spun almost an entire rotation at the waist to build up speed to hurl the massive block of stone straight at her.

The block was bigger than her, simply dodging was going to be tricky. So she didn't even try.  
"Let's go Dusty!" She yelled, aura flaring even brighter as she fired herself at the oncoming mass feet first.

Gravity Kicks might not be strong enough to get through the mechs armor, but one was more than enough to shatter the already-weakened rubble. It split apart into solid chunks, Kat catching as many as she could in a stasis field before firing them straight back.

Even split apart, the repeated impacts had enough weight behind them to stagger the mech as they collided with it's torso. And then, while its balance was off, another Gravity Kick smashed into its shoulder.

  


Iris had just made it out through the front door, passing by the maniacally laughing goons left tied up in the loading bay, when she heard the bang. She spun to look as Kat came launching backwards in a shower of sparks from one of the spotlights that had exploded under the impact. 

She couldn't help but stare as the mech toppled backwards and smashed through another wall. There was a muffled crash as something in the cloud of dust detonated and black smoke started to billow out of the hole and rise into the brightening blue sky.

But even with the smoke, she could still see the glowing red lightning that streaked Kat's body as she flew through the cloud and dropped to the ground to catch her breath.  
"Kat! Over here!" Iris got her attention, pulling her into the middle of the street and further away from the building.  
"I think he put up more of a fight outside the robot." Kat said, looking proud of herself.  
"Don't go getting cocky-"

The sound of creaking metal stopped the conversation short as this time a giant hulking shadow appeared amongst the smoke.  
"Did you think this thing couldn't stand up again?" Pipe's voice boomed out of a speaker somewhere on the mech.  
"I'll just keep knocking it down then! Something will break eventually!"  
"We'll see about that."

The mech came launching out of the smoke, putting on another impressive burst of speed as it practically sprinted towards the two heroes. Every step tore chunks out of the pavement. Kat’s aura burst into life as she launched back into the air, veering left while Iris darted went right with a half-second to spare before the mech’s fist smashed into the ground they’d been occupying with enough force to embed itself almost up to the elbow joint.

Kat did not want to know what that kind of impact would do to a person. She floated back a little further, ready to evade if it came after her again. Unfortunately, despite how much she had pissed Pipe off, he instead decided to go after the much less agile Sapphire Iris. The arm tore free of the ground, throwing fist sized rocks in every direction just from the motion as he turned after her.

  


Iris ’d just hit the side of the pavement when she heard the crashing sound and Kat yelling out a warning. The half-empty water bottle at her hip exploded as she forced the water inside to fan out behind her and freezing it into a shield. While thin, it managed to protect her from the worst of the debris before shattering like glass when the mech crushed it underfoot.

And Iris had hit a wall. There were no doors to duck into and no alleyways on this side of the road. She turned around, back against the brickwork, as the robot towered over her. It stopped, letting the moment sink in.  
“Some rain would be real nice about now!” She said under her breath with a glance at the clear blue sky that just wasn’t going to play along any time soon.

So with that option off of the table, what did she have? A full water bottle left, but there wasn’t really anything she could do with that little water against a mech that still looked perfectly water tight. No ice shield would protect her from a direct attack. And with that thing’s speed and how close it was, she wasn’t going to have time to make one even if it could save her.

Going left or right was a gamble. If it guessed which way she’d go, she was dead. And even if she won, she was still in just as much trouble. But, while she didn’t have Valkyrie, she did have Kat. Which did leave her one option. A stupid one, but she’d take stupid over the coin flip of her other option. She glared up at the mech, before tapping the button on her radio.  
“Kat, on my mark, hit its shoulder.”

She didn’t wait for a response, she just had to trust Kat was quick enough as she sprinted straight at the mech while yelling at the top of her lungs. Thankfully the gravity shifter was already moving by the time the mech’s pilot reacted to the crazy hero charging at him. A metal gauntlet almost as big as Iris herself came rocketing towards her, only to go wide as Kat hit her mark.

Iris slid underneath the arm, regretting her decision to wear a skirt at the scrapes that caused on her legs. Still Kat only had the mech staggered for a moment, so she popped back up to her feet and sprinted as fast as she could between its tree-trunk sized legs. And then she kept on going, across the road and into an alleyway.  
“You aren’t getting away!”  
“Try me!”

  


Valkyrie and Rider had just turned the corner onto a street of abandoned houses, the black smoke from the factory very close, when they saw Iris come hurtling out of an alleyway between two of the houses with Kat flying overhead. Iris vaulted a garden fence and swerved down the street, eyes lighting up as she spotted the other two heroes.

The reason for her haste becoming more than apparent. There was a crash that sounded out for miles across the abandoned zone as the giant mech came smashing through the alleyway, cleaving a path big enough for it through the buildings either side. The spray of rubble forcing Kat away, it took off after Iris again. And it was gaining.

But Valkyrie had started sprinting for her partner too. And she got there first.  
“All yours!” Iris said with a wink as she darted around the copper-haired heroine.  
“On it,” Valkyrie called back as she skidded to a halt, planted her feet, and flipped the oncoming train of a mech the bird.

Down came the fist with all the power the robot could muster. This time there was a crack filling the air as the road tarmac shattered under the force. There was groaning of gears and machinery as the arm pressed down harder and harder. But Valkyrie refused to budge.

With hands gripping either side of the enormous metal gauntlet, arms visibly shaking from the strain, she had caught the punch. Her spare set of boots hadn’t survived, joining the destroyed tarmac at the bottom of the small crater the blow had caused.  
“Is that the best you got?” Valkyrie growled as the mech gave up trying to crush her. The moment the pressure lessened, she shifted her grip and started to pull back, ready to rip the entire limb from its mounting.

There was creaking and groaning of metal as it resisted. Sparks started flying from the shoulder joint and she could hear the internal workings straining and starting to give way. But it didn’t happen fast enough to prevent the mech pulling her into the air and introducing her to the fact it could rotate at the waist.

One full rotation, then a second, gaining more and more speed. By the third, even Valkyrie couldn’t maintain her grip anymore and she was flung free. A wall above a house doorway broke her fall, brickwork cracking as her spine and the back of her skull bounced off of it. She fell forwards, straight onto the punch from the charging mech.

  


“Kairi!” Iris yelled as it slammed her through the house’s front wall, dust and debris flying everywhere. There was silence broken up only by the sounds of the mech’s massive footsteps as it moved back into the middle of the street. 

“Valkyrie, speak to me!” Iris tried her radio, Rider stepping up beside her, dragging his bike in tow as he kept a careful eye on the currently immobile mech.  
“ _I’m okay…_ ” came the pained response, “ _going to be sore later though._ ”  
“Well if it’s strong enough to hurt you maybe don’t get into a punching match with it!”  
“ _Will do. Just let me catch my breath…_ ”

Kat dropped down beside Rider and Iris, letting her powers fade to give Dusty a break. The trio were far enough away from the mech that she’d have time to move if it charged them. But it seemed perfectly happy to stay where it was, just turning to face the three heroes.  
“Did you all really expect us to go through all the trouble of building this thing if it couldn’t beat the local _heroes_?” Pipe’s voice mocked them all, “and if I can take out the Valkyrie, what hope do you three weaklings have?”  
“You haven’t beaten us yet!” Kat fired back. Rider nodded along, Iris just shrugged and flipped a rude gesture at him.  
“Then let’s fix that. See here’s the thing, you guys caught us off guard. So the power core wasn’t ready. But it’s warmed up now-”

Yet more craters were blasted into the street as the mech braced it’s feet, throwing both its arms out wide. There was a strange humming starting to emanate from somewhere inside it, an almost buzzing noise that was rapidly getting louder and louder.  
“ _Do I want to know what’s going on out there?_ ” Valkyrie asked over her radio.  
“Nothing good!” Iris replied, “just stay hidden until we know what we’re dealing with.”

The buzzing noise had become loud enough that it was almost painful. Even Dusty was shying away from it. Then, without warning, the noise vanished. Silence fell for a moment. Kat stared at the robot, confused. There was no way that was it?  
“All charged. Showtime!”

  


Several panels of the mech’s armor shifted, revealing themselves to be small portholes as several head-sized orbs slid out of their hidden compartments. One on each shoulder, another pair on the side of the mech’s waist, two running down the center of its back and the last in the middle of its torso. The orbs seemed to be made out a translucent yellow material, although what it was Kat couldn’t tell. But they certainly made made out of the same stuff as the mech’s armor, so she took to the air and was about to launch a gravity kick at one when they started to shine.

Another buzzing noise filled the air as a white light filled the center of each orb. Compared to the low drone of the one before, this sound was higher pitched and was more like a crackle. Which was precisely what was causing it, as bolts of electricity starting coming from the lights and slamming into the inside of the orbs. The lights grew stronger and even larger until they filled the entirety of the orbs, and then the lightning wasn’t contained inside anymore.

Bolts jumped from orb to orb, running across the metal armor and searing black marks into the ground around the mech. A gravity kick was out of the question, Kat knew, flying into that lightning barrier might as well be suicide.  
“See, no hero can touch me now!” Pipe cackled, “and we’re not done yet!”

On the right arm, the one that had appeared to be nothing more than a giant slab of metal, a large crack started to form that ran down its center. The metal split into two, part sliding upwards and part sliding down until it looked like a strange fork. Jolts of electricity started to jump between the two prongs, running up and down the weapon and rapidly growing in number and intensity.

Kat still had no idea what she was looking at, but it became clear the moment the arm started to move. It was slow, almost methodical, until it was pointed straight at the damaged building that Valkyrie had been smashed into.  
“Kairi mo-” Iris started to yell before she was drowned out by the roar of the weapon firing.

Iris and Rider only saw a flash of light slam into part of the remaining wall and tear straight on through. Kat however was high enough to see that it didn’t stop there. The bolt of light ripped out the other side of the house, and through the house on the other side before crossing the next street over and doing it all again. Even she couldn’t tell how far it managed to go, and all in the blink of an eye. She couldn’t help but stare at the line of devastation, until Pipe’s voice shook her out of it.  
“Now I’m not a betting man, but I’d put money that none of the heroes in this city can stand up to a railgun.”

He put a second shot through the building’s roof just to drill the point home, cackling with glee as the structure started to collapse and cave in from all the damage he’d caused. Then the mech turned the railgun down the street.  
“Scatter!” Iris yelled as she pushed Rider away, taking off in the opposite direction. Kat went even higher into the air, but Pipe’s aim didn’t swing up after her.

  


Rider gritted his teeth, apologizing to his bicycle before hurling it into a nearby garden. He couldn’t run as fast while dragging it. The extra burst of speed that gave him was all that saved him as he vaulted a fence, a rush of air behind him followed by the boom as a massive swath of the pavement was vaporised by a railgun shot. Already the hum of it charging another shot was filling the air, so he scrambled to his feet and aimed for a nearby door. Ramming into it as hard as he could, he managed to batter it off its hinges and topple inside, ducking around the corner of the entranceway and pressing himself up against the wall.

“Come out, come out, Rider of Justice, don’t you want to interfere with my business again? It worked so well last time,” came the mocking tones of the mech’s pilot as it stomped its way down the street, it’s shadow stopping in front of the doorway and passing mere inches away from where he was hiding. He glanced further into the house, down the hallway. It opened up into a perfectly ordinary looking living room, if covered in dust from having been abandoned. No obvious escape route there.

So instead he rushed for the stairs, vaulting them two at a time. The wall behind him exploded inwards from another blast of the railgun that tore through the entire building. Even the stairs just behind him weren’t spared, blown into splinters under the sheer force. He stumbled as he reached the landing, dropping flat on the ground. Just in time for a second blast to smash through the second floor’s wall just above his head.

He held his breath, eyes squeezed shut behind his goggles and arms over his head as he felt the shockwave of the shot passing over him. It almost crushed him into the floor and he could feel the heat starting to burn through his suit. No third shot came. He looked up, barely able to see anything through the dust and debris. He was aware of voices in his radio but his ears were still ringing too hard to make them out.

His heart was pounding against his chest, his hands shaking as he pulled them from his head. A lump welled in his throat and made it hard to breathe. But he was still alive. Outmatched and outgunned, sure, but alive nonetheless. He rose to his feet, moving on unsteady legs across floor that could give way at any moment, over to the hole that had been blasted through the wall.

There was still too much dust and smoke to see what was going on outside. But the little light that was filtering through meant that the mech wasn’t standing there anymore. Mumen Rider shook his head, trying to clear the ringing from his ears, and clenched his still-shaking hands before stepping up to the edge.

As he started to climb down, hanging from the hole in the wall, something gripped ahold of his ankle and pull him free. He yelped as he fell backwards, right into Valkyrie’s arms. She looked about as messy as he did, copper-hair almost grey from the amount of dust that coated her.  
“Good to see he missed you too, Rider.” She smiled as she lowered him down, the two taking cover behind the front yard’s fence.

  


Rider peeked up and over the fence, seeing the mech had been lured down the other end of the street by Kat. It was firing again and again, railgun blasts ripping through the open air above the rooftops, but none came close enough to even ruffle her scarf in the shockwave.

“So what’s the plan?” He asked, “we can’t stall it forever. And the pilot mentioned a power core, so I doubt it’ll run out of fuel anytime soon.”  
“No, already thought of that,” Valkyrie admitted, before looking up and smiling as Iris vaulted the fence and dropped down beside the two, “how’d it go?”  
“No good,” Iris sighed, holding up her phone, “couldn’t get a signal.”  
“So much for calling in backup. Kanon would be real nice about now.”

Rider didn’t recognize the name, but he supposed it didn’t matter. They were on their own.  
“Saki,” Valkyrie said, tone calm and thoughtful, “we still had phone signal back at the car-”  
“No!” Iris snapped, Rider flinching away and wishing he wasn’t stuck between the two of them, “you are not sending me away to get help.”  
“But-”  
“You promised me that we’d stick together. Besides, what if it chases me? We parked on the edge of the abandoned zone, what happens when it starts firing that railgun towards the inhabited part of the city!”

While the two of them were arguing, Rider could still hear the railgun firing. Flashes of light lit up the sky above them. Kat was still in danger and they were just wasting time.  
“Enough!” He snapped at the two B Class heroes as he stood, looking towards the rampaging mech in the distance, “we have a job to do.”

He place his hand on the fence, about to vault over back onto the street, when Valkyrie grabbed his arm. She stood herself, giving an almost-embarrassed smile as she glanced across at him.  
“Sorry, Rider, but this is our city. Only fair we do the heavy lifting.” She winked and hopped over the fence herself, taking off running towards trouble and yelling over her shoulder as she went, “I’m not getting shown up by a C Class and an amateur!”

  


Kat’s eyes were really starting to hurt from having to keep looking at the walking lightning-rod of a mech. Every time the railgun fired, it left a red afterimage in her vision for several seconds. Which was making reading where it was going to shoot tricky. And on top of that, she’d been airborne too long.

She didn’t have a choice, she had to land and catch her breath. She picked a nearby rooftop, dropping down after a railgun blast went by. Her aura faded and Dusty materialised at her feet, the both of them looking exhausted. But she couldn’t stop moving, the railgun still following her every movement, so she took off sprinting across the slanted rooftops as fast as her legs would carry her.

The uneven terrain actually played to her advantage. Having to constantly adjust her speed to deal with the slanted rooftops, while jumping over chimneys and alleyways, meant that Pipe couldn’t lead his shot properly and the railgun shot smashed into the roof ahead of her.  
“You just won’t stop being a pain in the ass, just stop moving and die!”  
“Not gonna happen,” Kat grumbled under her breath, veering away from the hole in front of her in favour of dropping down onto the roof of a garage and then onto the street itself.

The mech turned to follow her, electricity flaring even brighter as it started to move, only for a yell from behind to stop it short. It rotated at the waist, looking in the opposite direction as Valkyrie tore a streetlamp out of the pavement. She hefted the heavy pole for a moment, before switching her grip and pulling it back like it was a javelin.  
“Let’s see that shield stop this!” She roared, taking a running start before hurling the makeshift metal spear as hard as she could muster.

The mech had been about to bring its railgun to bear on her, only to change its mind at the sight on the oncoming missile heading straight for its chest. Dropping the right arm down, it pulled up its left, the human-like gauntlet batting aside the streetlamp and sending it crashing through a window.  
“Oooooh, felt you had to block that one, huh? Built to fight me, my ass,” Valkyrie taunted, flipping a crude gesture in his direction for good measure.

While Kat wasn’t entirely sure what was going on, or why Valkyrie had gone insane, she couldn’t complain about the chance to catch her breath. While Valkyrie was not especially fast, she was able to use the dust clouds kicked up by the railgun to hide her movement, and the debris it left as it tore through the street made great throwing weapons.

And then Kat realised what she was doing, when a hurled brick clipped one of the lightning orbs on its waist. The orb cracked and there was a massive electrical discharge before the field stabilised again. If all of them were destroyed then no more shield.  
“Good to go, Dusty?” She asked the starry feline in her shadow.  
“Meow!”

While the ground nearby had escaped Pipe’s terrible shooting, just by virtue of Kat having stayed above the rooftops as much as possible, the mech had been heavy enough to crack the stone underfoot just by moving. Kat positioned herself in between as many of the footprints as she could, letting loose with a stasis field and tearing four slabs of pavement up into the air.

Four wasn’t many. Especially not when she had seven targets to aim for, which were sturdy enough to survive at least one shot from Valkyrie. She looked at the electricity-scorched stones that drifted around her. This wasn’t enough. She held them in place, aura flaring brighter and brighter as she concentrated, attempting to pull up more as she fired another stasis field.

  


Her aura blinked out, the stones crashed to the ground around her. Her vision swam and her head felt like it had caught fire. She collapsed to her knees, eyes squeezed shut as she clutched her head in the hope that the burning would stop.

“Meow,” she felt Dusty against her side. The comforting touch gave her something to latch onto, to ground herself. It seemed to help, the pain in her head fading away into nothingness.  
“ _Never trying that again,_ ” Kat thought, finally able to open her eyes again and not prepared for what she saw. “ _Well that explains the burning._ ”

All around her was a great tunnel made of molten rock, holding itself together seemingly by its own will. Kat stood again, peering down the tunnel and trying to see if it had an end, not seeing one she instead turned to the ground beneath her feet. Much like yesterday, she found herself on another of those floating islands, this one charred black by the heat that had even the air itself warping under it.

She knew that she should be terrified of the fire all around her. Shocked, startled, something. But instead there was the strange sense of familiarity. She’d been here before, wherever here was. A name came drifting out of the fog of her memories.  
“A Rift Plane?”

A place separate from reality. The thought was actually somewhat comforting, at least that meant that giant fire tunnels weren’t common. In fact, Kat was getting the feeling that she’d come to this place originally to put something right. What, she couldn’t remember, but that could wait.

She turned away from the edge, turning her gaze instead to the large white tree that somehow still managed to survive in the middle of this tunnel of fire. Much like the one from before, that had returned the Spiral Claw to her, there were several apples amongst its branches that started to shine as she approached.  
“Alright, what have you got for me?” She asked, raising her hand towards them as they burst into light and rushed to meet her.

Kat felt the lights connect, a surge of energy running through her body. Her vision cleared from the lights, and she was back in the street as though she had never left. The mech had barely moved from where it was chasing Valkyrie. Dusty looked up at her as she dropped her arm to her side. She met his gaze and gave a confident smile.  
“Ready?”  
“Meow.”  
“Good. Let’s get him!”

  


There was a roar of wind as Kat’s powers flared back into life, the constantly shifting gravity warping the air around her as it grew more and more forceful. The red lightning that ran through her body flared with even more intensity as she focused the raging power, channeling it down. With a cry, the ground under her shattered and now chunks of concrete joined the storm. There were only four at first, but more were already being pulled up.  
“Gravity Typhoon!”

Volley after volley of rock fired down the street as though they’d been fired from a cannon. The lightning orbs on the mech, placed to give the most coverage for the electric shield, were easy targets. The yellow made them stand out against the black armor.

The two on the shoulders exploded first, bursting in a massive spray of sparks and light. And before either Pipe or Valkyrie could react, the two on either side of its waist joined them. Valkyrie peered around the hulking machine, shocked at the almost machine-gunning of rubble that was now slamming into its back, destroying the two there and filling the air with the sound of stone smashing into metal.

The barrage stopped, Kat now floating in the middle of a crater where there used to be road. The mech had almost toppled forwards, having to push itself back up with its left arm. Slowly it rotated at the waist until it was staring straight at her. Kat could see the last lightning orb on its chest, smirking as Pipe moved the gauntlet arm in front of it. He was having to shield his shield generator now.  
“You- why do you have to ruin _everything_?!” He screeched, voice cracking in sheer rage. Kat wasn’t sure if the smoke rising from the mech was from the destroyed lightning orbs or from him.

Sparks ran up the prongs of the railgun and Kat got ready to dodge the moment he swung it at her. But he paused.  
“Everything was just fine until you showed up. Stealing parts, building this, we were going to pull off the bank heist to end all bank heists. Until you ruined it.”  
“Not just her!”

  


Kat looked over her shoulder, startled at the sudden sound as Mumen Rider came flying out of an alleyway on his bike, having circled around using the next street over. Pedalling like a madman, he caught a raised bit of pavement and used it as a makeshift ramp to jump the cratered ground. Even with his goggles on, his eyes met Kat’s as they passed, before the moment was lost, his tires hit the ground and he kept right on going, straight at the mech.

“Oh you want to die first? So be it!” Pipe screamed as the mech charged forwards itself. “She can watch me crush you!”  
Kat certainly didn’t agree with that plan. She was about to take after Rider, she knew she could fly faster than he could pedal, but Iris’ voice over her radio told her to hold, asking her to trust him.

Rider weaved around the blast of the railgun, the force of the shockwave almost knocking him from his bike but he recovered. Kat hadn’t tried to intercept him yet, and he could see Valkyrie moving into position through the mech’s legs.  
“ _So far, so good,_ ” he thought to himself as he was only seconds away from the giant titan of a machine that had leveled buildings like they were nothing. And he was just a human. With a bicycle. 

But not just any bicycle, no.  
“Let’s go, Justice!” He cried as the mech’s shadow engulfed him, it’s fist bearing down. Nowhere to go, he had too much momentum to stop. But that was fine, he wasn’t planning on stopping.

He threw his back tire sideways, slamming on the brakes and using the sudden shift of momentum to launch himself off of the bike. The massive metal gauntlet slammed into the ground underneath him, as he rolled across it on his back. His protective gear did it’s job, not only shielding him from the impact and the heated metal, but also the flying electricity.

He kicked off of the arm, as hard as he could. The momentum from the roll spun him in mid-air, bringing his elbow straight into the center of the last lightning orb. He’d thrown his whole body weight into the blow, feeling the material buckle and warp. It was too much, the electricity inside the orb going haywire and making it explode in a shower of sparks.

Rider dropped to the floor. The shards of metal from the explosion had torn the entire left side of his suit to ribbons, which meant he had taken the full brunt of the electrical discharge. His body didn’t want to respond to him, but that didn’t matter anymore. The shield was down.

  


Kat had followed Iris’ advice and waited. She regretted it the moment she saw Rider engulfed in sparks. She watched him fall to the tarmac, body convulsing as he collapsed in a heap. Right between the mech’s legs.  
“Rider!” She took off, as fast as she could, as one of those tree-trunk sized limbs rose up.

Only to slam back where it started, trying to regain balance, as there was an enormous crunch and rending of metal. Valkyrie stood over Rider, arm embedded up to the shoulder in the mech’s other leg. The armor had been sturdy, sure, but even it couldn’t stand up to a straight right fist at full force.

“Well doesn’t this feel important,” she laughed as she tore her arm free, clutching at several wires and a crushed piston in her grip. She took a half step back, raising her other arm and the full water bottle she was carrying in it.  
“Iris, you’re up!”

The bottle went through the hole. Valkyrie couldn’t see it, but she could hear it explode open. Some of water inside instantly freezing, sending shards of ice tearing into the internals. The rest soaked the remaining pistons and gears before flash freezing. The sheer weight of the mech, the repeated impacts they’d suffered from it moving and now a sudden temperature drop was too much for the metal and the entire limb buckled and warped, sending the mech toppling forwards.

Straight were Valkyrie was waiting with a fist pulled back. She’d braced herself as much as she could, putting all of her strength into an uppercut as the heavy robot fell right on top of it. There was a vicious bang, shockwave that buffeted everything. Kat froze, stunned, as the mech went sailing through the air tens of meters before crashing down on its back.

Valkyrie dusted herself off nonchalantly before helping Rider to his feet. They looked over at the fallen mech as the dust settled. It’s front armor was buckled, almost sheared straight off its mounting just from the force of that punch. And yet it was still trying to move, using its metal gauntlet to push itself back into a sitting position.  
“You have got to be shi-” Valkyrie was cut off as a black and red streak shot by.

  


Inside the cockpit, things were not good. The backlash from the lightning shield going down had fried the railgun, one leg was destroyed and there was no shock absorbers on the planet that could withstand what Valkyrie had just done. Every viewscreen and dial that hadn’t shattered were reading warnings.

Pipe growled to himself, unstrapping himself from the pilot’s chair and furiously tapping controls trying to find something that worked. The cameras that showed what had happening outside were all dead too. No matter, He’d get the mech working again by sheer force of will if he had to. Then a crashing impact to the armor in front of the cockpit knocked the wind out of him as it slammed him back into chair.

He looked at the metal that was supposed to shield him from outside as it warped and rended, light starting to peer in as the cockpit put up one last desperate fight. Then the metal gave up, entire panels ripped away by a stasis field as Pipe found himself looking straight into Kat’s eyes, glowing white against her black aura.  
“Get out.” She said, grabbing him by the front of the shirt and throwing him out of the robot.

The armor plates embedded themselves in the ground beside him as Kat rocketed back into the air, turning her attention back to the cockpit. She shot back towards the mech, Dusty appearing beside her and dispersing into stardust that shifted around her and formed a massive set of claws as she started to spin.

The Spiral Claw tore through the cockpit and sent scraps of metal armor flying as she ripped a hole straight out the mech’s back, skidding to a halt as it finally collapsed in a shower of sparks. The lights in the cockpit finally faded and it stopped moving.

Pipe gaped at the sight. That should not be possible. There was no way that those heroes should have been strong enough to pull that off. He rolled onto his knees, about to scramble away while the coast was clear, only for a woman in blue to step into his path.  
“Going somewhere?” Sapphire Iris asked, smiling a devious smile. “Oh no, we’re not done with you yet.”


	12. The Next Move

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we're back! Sorry that took so long, hopefully the other Gravity Rush stuff you got in the break helped tide things over. Still that break was way too long and I'm going to try and not have you guys have to wait a month for the next chapter again.
> 
> Big thanks to Stumblingcamelid for cleaning this up. Probably saved me a couple days of fiddling with rewrites there.

## Chapter 12 - The Next Move

It was over. Finally. With the mech destroyed and Iris dealing with the last goon, Kat could finally catch her breath. Using the Gravity Typhoon and Spiral Claw in quick succession had taken a lot out of her, especially after having spent most of the fight airborne. Even Dusty looked exhausted, ears and tail flagging as the two collapsed on one of the few patches of pavement that hadn’t been destroyed.

Kat sat up and hugged her knees, feeling her arms shaking as the adrenaline surge started to fade. She couldn’t help but stare at the destroyed hunk of metal that had caused so much damage. They had been lucky to fight in the abandoned zone, since if it had come after them in the city proper… Kat shuddered at the thought. She had seen just how far the railgun’s devastation had spread: there would be no telling how big the body count would have gotten if it had been in a populated area.

As she lost herself in that train of thought, a hand suddenly came down, startling her. Valkyrie chuckled and gave a smile that broke through the layers of dust and debris that coated her.  
“Good job, kiddo. Looks like you pack a punch, busting through armor like that.”  
“Seems like it.” Kat glanced back over to the mech, staring at the hole she’d managed to tear through its torso.  
“Well, don’t go getting too cocky, I softened it up for you.”

Valkyrie leaned down and ruffled Kat’s hair, laughing again at the displeased look she got in return and the dusty handprint she left behind. But Kat’s annoyed gaze shifted as she noticed the arm draped over Valkyrie’s shoulder, as the B-class hero propped up a still-dazed looking Mumen Rider.

He was caked in almost as much dust as Valkyrie was. The only parts that were not coated were the pale rings around his goggled eyes and his entire left side that had been seared by the shock-orb. His suit had been shredded, and the exposed skin was seared an ugly red.

Valkyrie’s smile wavered as she traced Kat’s gaze. She sighed before lowering him until he was sitting on the pavement too.  
“Don’t get too angry with him,” she looked pointedly at Kat. “If he hadn’t done it, I would have.”  
“I’m not angry,” Kat replied. Valkyrie didn’t look convinced but decided to roll with it.  
“Then do you mind keeping an eye on him? Me and Iris need to go call all this in, and keep an eye on the goon squad until the cops show up.”

Rider seemed to snap out of his daze at that, asking about the two grunts they had left in the garage. Valkyrie laughed at that. They weren’t going anywhere anytime soon, not trapped inside the back of their van.  
“And if we do lose those two, it isn’t too big a deal,” she called back over her shoulder as she walked towards Sapphire Iris. “But I don’t want that mech out of our sight until we can figure out where the hell it came from!”

Kat wasn’t entirely sure what the point was as the damage it had taken guaranteed it wasn’t going to be walking off anytime soon. But Valkyrie seemed to know what she was doing, so it seemed best to follow along for the moment. She watched as Valkyrie approached her partner, grabbed Pipe by the back of the neck, hauled him to his feet, and the three headed off in the direction of the factory where everything had started.

After all the fighting, the creaking of metal, crashing of stone, crackle of electricity and the roar of the railgun firing; the silence that filled the street seemed deafening. Seconds felt like minutes in the quiet, neither of the heroes knowing how to break it, until Rider shifted his arm and the hiss of pain that escaped from him caught Kat’s attention.

He gave an uneasy smile as the two stared at each other. There was no denying the concern in the gravity shifter’s eyes. He didn’t need Iris’ powers to recognize that emotion. He reached up with his undamaged right hand, ruffling his hair and sending wisps of grey dust flying from the motion. 

“It looks worse than it is. Some burn cream and it’ll be good as new in a couple days,” he insisted. “The shock wasn’t much stronger than a stun gun- ow!” He stopped as she leaned around his back and prodded his burned shoulder.  
“You didn’t know that when you jumped at it, did you?” Kat asked, pulling back so she could meet his eyes again.  
“I was pretty sure it wasn’t lethal. It wasn’t even trying to use it on us even before you took out most of the generators.”  
“And if you’d been wrong? What if it had really hurt you?”  
“I don’t care. I had to try. I can’t just stand by and watch.”

Kat wasn’t sure how to respond to that. She could see he’d meant every word. And Valkyrie had said she’d have done the same too. And really, so would Kat. The two drifted back into silence, Kat hugging a knee to her chest. Both stared towards the smoking ruins of the giant mech.

She remembered the bruises his back had taken during their fight with Ironarms. She remembered acid eating through his jacket during the fight with the giant millipede monster. And now this injury too. And the way he was waving off her concern, as though it was nothing special. Something about it just felt wrong, offputting.

But before she could put it into words, something else caught Dusty’s attention. The feline had been sprawled across the pavement by her side, but suddenly his ears pricked up. The dull lights in his body flared into life, stars and galaxies moving under his fur as he rolled back onto his feet.

“Dusty? What’s up?” Kat called out as he stepped away from her, looking all around and ears twitching as he was clearly sensing something. Then, just as Kat was pulling herself to her feet, he suddenly shot towards the fallen mech, bounding up its carcass and vanishing inside.

“You stay put!” Kat told Rider before he could stand too, as she raced after her cat. He decided not to tempt fate and listened, keeping watch as Kat scrambled over the sheets of metal. She climbed onto the mech’s torso and leaned over the hole she had bored through its chest.

She could see straight through it, all the way down the pavement it was laying on. It took her a moment to spot Dusty as he climbed into a mess of gears and wires behind what used to be the cockpit.  
“What are you doing?” Kat asked as she dropped down into the hole, trying to see around her cat to spot what had his attention.

No luck there, so she reached up, grabbed Dusty by the midsection and pulled him out. Dusty put up surprisingly little fight, bursting into black motes of light that hovered around Kat as she peered into the hole. More wires, chunks of metal and machinery that she couldn’t even begin to guess the purpose for. She couldn’t figure out what, if anything, was catching Dusty’s attention.

But then she started to notice a faint buzzing in the air. A strange charged sensation flowing through her. It felt familiar. Not electricity, but more like a weaker version of the rush she got when gravity shifting. Now aware that _something_ was definitely here, she reached her arm into the gaps between the metal, pushing wires aside and trying to see deeper into the machine.

It took a couple moments, but eventually she found something. A metal plate fell away, revealing a sphere no larger than Dusty’s head. She couldn’t tell what it was made of in the dim light cast from the hole above, but the moment her fingertips brushed it, the rush of energy that raced down her arm was enough that her red aura flared into life.

She pulled backwards, startled. The rush of power faded. Dusty reformed by her feet, looking up at her, seeming just as confused as she was.  
“Okay, we need to get at whatever that is,” she told him.  
“Mrow.”  
“You guy’s doing okay in there?” Rider’s voice called out from outside.  
“We’re fine! We’ll be done in a minute!” Kat had almost forgotten about him, her focus caught up by the puzzle in front of her.

She reached back for the sphere, ready this time for her powers to activate on their own. But, no matter how hard she pressed herself against the edge of the machine or stretched her arm, it remained just out of reach. Time and time again her fingers slipped off of the sphere, unable to get a grip to pull it free.

A jagged piece of metal dug into her arm, scratching her pretty badly. Clearly this was not working. Fortunately for her, she had a good plan B. She pulled her arm back enough that the sphere was no longer interfering with her powers any more, needing to control them as she focused a small stasis field.

The burst of light illuminated the hole. She could hear Rider reacting, but she paid him no mind as she channeled the field through the innards of the mech, focusing so it only grabbed ahold of the orb. She felt it give way as she stepped back, pulling it with her.

There was the snapping of wires, the shearing of metal bolts, and then the sphere was floating in the air before her. Now free from the mech and actually in the light, she could see it looked very similar to that of the shock-spheres: a metal frame around a murky glass-like ball.

But unlike the shock-spheres, this orb contained something inside of it. She let it float higher and more into the light so she could get a better look. It was some kind of crystal, but the details were hard to make out through the dark glass.  
“One way to fix that,” she said to Dusty, flying back out of the mech and landing on the road outside.

Rider was climbing to his feet, looking confused at the sudden addition of a strange floating orb. But before he could say anything, Kat’s aura flashed red and she fired the sphere at the ground as hard as she could. It splintered into fragments, forcing both humans and the cat to move away to avoid the flying shards.

But amongst all the metal and glass, pinging off of the pavement and now visible in the morning light, a vivid purple gemstone. A flat rectangular prism, with its edges smoothed away and able to fit in the palm of a hand. It bounced a few times before coming to a rest, seeming to give of a faint glow beyond that of reflected sunlight. Clearly it was no ordinary jewel.

Rider hadn’t seen anything like it, and had no idea why it would have been inside the mech. Kat, however, felt that same sense of familiarity with it that she had with the visions of those strange apple trees. It was something she knew. 

Her powers faded as she slowly stepped over to the gemstone, Dusty keeping pace beside her. It this thing was something from her memories, she had to find out what.

“Kat, are you sure this is a good idea?” Rider felt he had to say something when he saw the determined look in her eye. Everything about this situation felt off to him. Unfortunately his radio had gotten fried so he couldn’t call Valkyrie or Iris as Kat seemed to not even notice him, bending down to pick up the gemstone.

The moment her hand made contact, there was a horrendous rending noise that seemed to echo from nowhere and everywhere at once. Kat’s aura burst into life again, the pavement beneath her feet disintegrating into dust as a massive stasis field rocketed through the street.

Rider had shielded his eyes as the sphere of bright light raced by, the feeling of weightlessness as it passed through him proving disorientating. But thankfully it was only momentary, and he didn’t find himself floating away. He lowered his arm, looking around to find everything much the same as it had been before. Kat was just as puzzled, standing before him and still holding the gem.  
“What just happened?” she asked.  
“Don’t ask me.”  
“Mrow,” Dusty added, headbutting Kat’s leg to get her attention. 

Both heroes noticed he was staring intently at something above, and followed his gaze. Where the sky had been a clear blue, now dark red clouds seemed to spiral out of nothingness, a jagged hole in the air itself.  
“A gravity rift?” Rider heard Kat murmur, almost to herself as they gaped at the alien sight.

The swirling clouds were almost hypnotic and the tear in the sky flickered between every colour imaginable. Rider couldn’t help but wonder how he would ever describe this sight to anyone else, they’d never believe it. Then his brain clicked back into gear.  
“Kat,” he turned to her, seeing her coiled like a spring and ready to launch herself skyward. “Wait! Does your radio still work?”  
“Huh?” It took her a moment to tear her eyes away from the rift, “I think so.”

Rider held out his good hand. Kat realised what he wanted and passed over the small device. He gave a quick thanks as he slipped the earpiece in place. He took a step back, glancing back skywards before meeting Kat’s eyes.  
“Be careful.”

She looked almost offended that he felt the need to say it. The quiet awkward girl of before had faded, back to her usual confidence and drive. She tossed the gemstone to him, which thankfully did not seem to react to his touch the way it had hers, before floating towards the rift. Dusty’s motes of stardust left a trail in her wake.

“Iris, Valkyrie, you hear me?” Rider asked into the radio, watching their ascent.  
“ _Just me,_ ” Valkyrie’s voice came through. “ _Iris’s gone to the car to get a phone signal. What’s up?_ ”  
“You in the factory?”  
“ _Babysitting the goon squad. Why, did something happen?_ ”  
“You could say that. Take a look outside.”  
“ _...What the hell is that?_ ” Iris’ voice joined in, “ _I can see it from all the way over here!_ ”  
“ _See wha- oh. Yeah, the hell is that?_ ”

The question Rider now faced was: how on earth was he going to explain that? He had no idea where to even begin. Still, that was probably best saved for later, more important was filling them in on what Kat was doing as she was almost at the edge of the clouds, her aura getting harder and harder to spot amongst them.

The red clouds, as ominous as they looked from the ground, felt no different than an ordinary cloud as Kat ran a hand through it. Now that she was closer to the rift they were pouring out from, the feeling of familiarity got stronger and stronger. The wind blowing through it seemed warm, welcoming; it seemed to carry a strange scent on the air that made her think of market stalls in a square, a large fountain at the center. It felt like _home_.

The desire to fly past the event horizon and into the rift itself grew by the second. Even if just for a moment, just a peek. She could come back if there wasn’t anything on the other side. But before she could, the decision was taken from her. There was an echoing crash from inside the rift, the clouds briefly flashing purple as three black wisps passed through.

Unlike Dusty’s wisp form, these seemed much thicker, seeming more like a blackened ooze that had dripped out of the rift and fell to earth. Rider scrambled away as the wisps hit the pavement around him. They started to warp and shift, forming more solid shapes.

One thin spindly leg, formed from each cloud, followed by another, then two more. A fifth limb, much longer and seeming more like a tendril, sprouted out of the front of the creatures strange bodies. Then a depression seemed to form in its square torso, a depression that was rapidly filled. But instead of a head forming, what appeared instead was a blood red orb.

Dusty was hissing as the trio of creatures, now about chest-height in size, twitched and skittered. Rider looked unnerved, backing away further as he tried to talk into his radio. Out of the corner of her eye, Kat could see the red clouds being sucked back into the rift, the tear in the sky starting to shrink into itself. It was closing, she had maybe moments before it was gone.

There was a fleeting thought of diving through while she had a chance. But before she let it take root in her mind, she turned away from the rift as the three creatures started to advance on Mumen Rider. They were clearly hostile, tendrils lashing towards him as he backed away further and further.

No time for thinking, no time for hesitation. Kat fired herself downwards, using her powers to give herself more and more momentum. She flipped herself over in midair until she was now diving feet-first, the movement somehow not slowing her at all, as she took aim at the creature closest to Rider.

“Dusty!” she called, asking for more speed, more power. She crashed down like a meteor, driving a gravity kick into the red core of the creature with all the force she could muster. Kat wasn’t sure why or how she knew, but she knew that was how to kill it.

She was right. She felt the core shatter underfoot, the creature’s black body turning back into wisps that faded into nothing as she bounced away, dropping to the ground between Rider and the two remaining entities.

They had paused at her arrival. It was hard to tell if she had pulled their attention away from Rider, until they charged towards her. Their movements, while still erratic and alien, were almost familiar to her. It was almost too easy to jump over the swinging tendril of one, rolling to her feet and turning the momentum into a swinging kick at the core of the second.

Kat had been in this fight before, she knew. She dodged and weaved through their attacks like it was second nature, driving kicks into the core of one that was rapidly changing hue from red to blue, before shattering with one last blow and fading away into nothingness.

One left. It didn’t seem afraid or cautious now that it had lost the numbers advantage, still attacking almost in a frenzy. It made no difference as Kat made short work of it. Within seconds the core shattered, and the being faded away.

As it did, finally, a name floated out of the fog of her memories.  
“Nevi,” Kat whispered, looking up at the empty sky that had returned to its usual clear blue.  
“Meow,” Dusty piped up, purring slightly as Kat crouched to scratch behind his ears.  
“Showed them who’s boss, huh?”

Quietly, unnoticed by them both, Rider dropped a chunk of concrete he had pulled up to use as a weapon. The fight had ended too fast for him to even attempt to get involved. He swapped the purple gemstone back to his good hand, wondering just what it was, and why it had reacted to Kat in the first place. It was starting to seem like there would be no end to the mysteries surrounding this girl.

 

**Hekseville - Auldnoir**

 

The unsettled tension amongst the city was growing by the day. Another Nevi attack on Endestria had left people starting to wonder if abandoning the district entirely was their only option. It was not a solution Syd agreed with, but he could see the desperate logic in it. The attacks were slowly getting more frequent, and repairing the damage the Nevi were causing was almost impossible already. With Kat still missing, it was only a matter of time before Hekseville’s other gravity shifter could no longer keep up.

The clock was ticking on finding answers, but they were still proving elusive. The only thing Syd had managed to dig up was a blurry photo taken of the last appearance of a girl wearing black and gold. It was taken from behind, so there was no way to see her face, but, apart from the missing scarf, the clothing seemed to match Kat’s.

Unfortunately, the blurry photo was useless on its own. There wasn’t enough detail to know for certain if it was Kat or not, as much as his gut told him it couldn’t be. There was no way she would be wandering around Hekseville without Dusty.

So, with little choice left to him, Syd had come to Auldnoir. He’d taken one last look around Kat’s pipe house, just in case he had missed any clues the last eight times he had searched, and then found his way to a very familiar storefront.

Sure, whoever was behind all this was managing to evade detection from the police. But it didn’t matter how smart, how well planned they were, as there was one person who would be able to see through everything and put Syd on the right path.  
“‘Yo Aki!” Syd called out as he stepped through the door of Pandora’s Fortunes. 

 

**G-City - Abandoned Zone**

 

It had taken a half hour for the police to make it into the abandoned zone, with multiple trucks arriving to pick up the seven gang members. As they were bundled away—Iris threw a wink at the female one as she passed—the police officers milled about and marveled at the destruction the mech had caused.

Valkyrie was dealing with giving the report to the officers in charge, standing by the fallen mech and glaring at anyone who got too close. She had not been happy when she had found out about the little misadventure with the gemstone, and so refused to let anyone else start fiddling with the giant robot.

“She’ll cool down pretty fast,” Iris told Kat as she pulled a water bottle out of a box that she had taken from the trunk of their car. They had managed to park it on one of the few street corners that had survived the fight.  
“I hope so,” Kat replied, taking the offered water bottle and feeling it chill in her hands as Iris’ eyes flashed blue.  
“She’s more annoyed she missed it than you causing trouble, y’know.”  
“You sure?” Kat seemed almost desperate to believe that. She hated the idea of making someone mad at her.  
“Definitely. ‘Sides, the amount of trouble she gets into when I’m not around, she’s got no room to complain about you two-”  
“Mrow!” Dusty piped up from below, seeming offended.  
“-you three.” Iris corrected.

Kat couldn’t help but laugh at the sheepish expression on Iris’ face as she apologised to Dusty. Just that was enough to take away some on the tension she was feeling as she popped open the water bottle and took a long drink.

The cold water seemed to wash away the exhaustion from the earlier battles. Kat hadn’t even realised how thirsty she was until she’d downed most of the bottle in one go. What was left floated into the air, as Iris guided it with hand gestures that Kat was almost certain were unnecessary. The water flowed into a disc shape and hovered just above the floor, letting Dusty lap at it as well.  
“We cool now?” Iris asked, kneeling down to look Dusty in the eyes.  
“Meow!”

Rider only drank half of the bottle given to him, choosing instead to pour the rest over his head and arm, washing away the worst of the dust that had coated him. He couldn’t help but wince at the sensation of cold water running across his burns.  
“Okay, when we’re done here, we are getting you to the hospital to get those looked at properly,” Iris said, looking up at him. Her serious tone of voice was undermined by the purring cat she was busily gving a belly rub too.

Rider didn’t protest. To not do that would be beyond reckless, so it was clearly the sensible course of action. It seemed to placate Kat as well. He could tell she had been worried, most likely that he would pull the same stunt he had with his back and try and tough it out. Although there was something that was puzzling him about the way Iris had phrased it.  
“Are we not done here already? The police have collected the gang members, Valkyrie has given them a statement, and they can come find us if they require a follow up.”

Iris stood back up, Dusty seeming disappointed at the loss of attention and moving over to Kat, who was quietly listening in. The B-class hero folded her arms, thinking for a moment, before shaking her head.  
“Normally you’d be right. We did our part, so now it’s the police take over.” She frowned, before continuing and growing increasingly animated with each word, “But they built a giant robot with a _railgun_ and some kind of rock in it that made the sky go all weird when Kat touched it! And I sure as hell want to know how they did it.”

Kat agreed with that. She looked down at a bundle of cloth—one of Valkyrie’s spare shirts—that had been wrapped around the purple crystal. She had already tried touching it again before Valkyrie had arrived, but it didn’t seem to trigger her powers anymore. There had still been a sensation of power coming from it, and so it hadn’t died completely, but it no longer seemed capable of making another gravity rift.

Rider and Iris had stopped talking, Iris picked up on Kat’s sudden shift in attention and Rider followed suit a second later. She gave a sheepish grin as she noticed the two of them staring at her.  
“So if we want to find out about this, why are we just standing around?” she asked. “Shouldn’t we be in the factory looking for clues? Like blueprints or something!”  
“Not that simple,” Rider said, sighing. “Strictly speaking it’s not our jurisdiction anymore.”  
“Huh?” Kat tilted her head, confused.  
“Heroes do the fighting, police do the investigating,” Iris cut in.  
“Our job finished the moment we apprehended the last guy.”

It was a system that worked pretty well, Iris explained. Most heroes didn’t really care for doing anything outside of the action, and the police generally didn’t take too kindly to letting amateurs run around messing with evidence. Interfering now that the crime was taken care of would land all three of the heroes in trouble with the Association.

“But you have a plan to get around that?” Kat asked. The grin she got in return all but confirmed it.  
“See, the Association only gives us C and B-class heroes so much wiggle room. Me and Valkyrie especially—long story—but if an A-class shows up then they’ll bend over backwards for them. And would you believe Valkyrie happens to know one.”  
“So you called in a favour.”  
“Not exactly. She’s something of an engineer, so giant robot seems like it’d be right up her alley. Shame we couldn’t call her earlier, she’d have made the fight way easier.”

Rider nodded, remembering the two arguing about calling in backup. This must be who they had been referring to.  
“So we’re just waiting until she arrives and can make sure the cops don’t cart off anything we need. Shouldn’t be too long-” Iris paused, hearing an engine from around the corner. “Well that was convenient timing.”

She walked over to the street corner, Kat and Dusty right behind her and curious to see what an A-class hero was like. They nearly walked straight into Iris’ back as she stopped in her tracks  
“What’s up?” Kat peered around her shoulder, looking at the white van that had pulled up behind Valkyrie’s car. “That your friend?”  
“Nope. That’s trouble.”

Iris spun around, pushing Kat backwards and trying to herd her back the way they had came. Rider was looking just as puzzled as Kat was, and he got even more so when the bundle of cloth with the gemstone in was thrust into his arms as Iris hoisted up the box of water bottles.  
“Follow my lead and we’ll get through this,” she said, looking deadly serious.

Rider and Kat shared a look, wondering just what was going on. The question became crystal clear as the new arrivals came around the corner. The reporter Kobayashi, microphone in hand and camera crew following behind. They spotted the trio-plus-cat immediately, Kat feeling nervous as Kobayashi’s eyes locked with hers. Dusty rubbed up against her leg, reassuring her.

“Sapphire Iris,” Kobayashi spoke as the group approached.  
“Hey!” Iris put on a wide smile as she greeted the reporter, then going full chatterbox before she could get another word in. “It’s nice to see you! Do wonder how you knew to show up, but don’t really have the time to chat. Gotta get Rider to the hospital and all, he got a little burned up. You need an interview with a hero then Valkyrie’ll cover for u-”  
“I’m not here for you heroes today.” Kobayashi cut her off.

That confused both Iris and Rider. They shared a look, knowing how unusual it was for a reporter to turn down an interview with a hero. Kobayashi must be there for something big if they were not the priority.  
“Oh.” It clicked in Iris’ head. She knew what it was. But before she could say anything, Kobayashi did it for her, stepping around her and stopping in front in Kat.

Of course. Between Rider praising her on TV and the numerous videos of her flying around the city from the day before, Kat had become something of a viral celebrity on the internet. Iris sighed to herself... An unofficial hero appearing out of nowhere, stopping multiple incidents, and she was cute as a button. Any reporter worth their salt would be dying to get an interview with her.

“I must apologise for being rude last time we met,” Kobayashi said to Kat, who was really not sure what to make of suddenly being the center of attention.  
“Uh… that’s okay?”  
“I offered you an interview, then insulted you the moment I found out about your situation,” the reporter continued. “I decided I would like to make things right.”  
“Really? How?” Kat took the bait, ending up with a microphone in her face again.  
“Giving you the chance to tell your side of the story,” Kobayashi smiled.

This wasn’t good. Iris scrambled for ideas. She knew Kobayashi: the reporter would have Kat wrapped around her fingers in minutes. Considering that Kat’s current living arrangements at the safehouse would get Rider into a lot of trouble, they had to stop the interview before that could happen.

Valkyrie was heading their way but wouldn’t make it in time. The moment Kat started talking then not even Valkyrie would be able to get Kobayashi to stop. They had to stall. Iris glanced down at the box full of water bottles she was carrying.  
“ _Idea._ ”

Kobayashi had gotten a nod from her camera crew and was about to launch into her first question when one of the bottles of water exploded into a thick spray of mist. The white watery cloud filled the space between the heroes and reporter, forcing Kobayashi and crew to take a step back in order to protect their equipment.  
“Run!” Iris yelled at the top of her lungs, bolting around the confused crew with Rider, Kat and Dusty right behind her.

“Saki!” The reporter yelled after them. “What is the meaning of this?”  
“Sorry Sis, gotta go!” Iris called back, eyes glowing blue as she kept the mist trailing behind them to dissuade pursuit.  
“Sis?” Kat asked, flying beside the sprinting heroes.  
“She’s my older sister, Ayame. Kobayashi’s the family name!” Iris said as they raced around the corner.

Kat took over the box of water bottles with Iris rapidly pulling her car keys out of the pocket hidden in her sash. There was no time to put the box in the trunk, so onto the backseat it went, Rider following behind as Iris pushed Kat into the passenger seat in the front.

She raced around the car, almost falling into the driver’s seat and fumbling to get the engine running. Everyone scrambled for their seatbelts as the car launched forwards, bumping across the damaged intersection and straight past the very annoyed looking reporter. Valkyrie had caught up too, standing beside Kobayashi with a matching look of annoyance.

Thankfully they were on the driver’s side of the vehicle, so Iris was blocking Kat’s view as her partner flipped them off for leaving her with that mess to deal with.  
“I’ll make it up to her later,” she told her passengers as they drove away.  
“What about waiting for your friend?” Kat asked, still trying to process what had just happened.  
“Oh trust me, running from Ayame is way more important-”

Iris cut off, a new sound coming over the car’s engine and getting louder and louder. A strange beating drone, unlike anything Kat had heard before. A shadow passed overhead, the noise powerful enough to almost shake the car.

Iris couldn’t help but smirk as Kat nearly choked herself with the seatbelt as she tried to turn and get a better look at it, until Iris lowered the windows and let her see the dull-green coloured helicopter that flew by, heading in the direction of the factory.  
“Looks like she just got here,” Rider deadpanned.  
“Yup. A-class gets all the cool perks.”

Iris would kill for a helicopter, but unfortunately had to settle for this boring, totally not as cool car. She leaned over, taking a grip on Kat’s scarf. The shifter was already halfway out the window, looking behind them, before she was yanked back into her seat.  
“You’ll meet her later,” Iris promised, “but first, the hospital!”


End file.
